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THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 


THE 


COLUMBFS  OF  LITERATURE 


OR, 


BACON'S 

MW  WORLD  OF  SCIENCES. 


BY 


W.  F.  C.  WIGSTON, 


AUTHOR  OF 


A  New  study  of  Shakespeare,"  "Bacon,  Shakespeare  and  the  Rosicrucians, 
"  Hermes  Stella,"  "  Francis  Bacon,  Poet,  Prophet  and  Philosopher." 


And  now  ^ve  have  Tvitli  a  small  bark,  sncli  as  we  were  able  to 
Bet  out,  sailed  about  the  universal  circumference,  as  well 
of  the  old  as  the  new,  World  of  Sciences,  with  how  pros- 
perous winds  and  course,  we  leave  to  posterity  to  judge. 
{Book  ix.  p.  467,  Advancement,  16M. ) 


CHICAGO: 

TE  &  CO.,  : 
298  Dearborn  Street. 


F.  J.  SCHULTE  &  CO.,  PUBLISHERS. 


Copyright,  1892, 
By  W.  F.  C.  WIGSTON. 


^^i^^J,t.^.^^M^   /^^^ 


GREAT  CLASSICAL  SCHOLAR 

AND 

UNFAILING   FRIEND, 

Sir  Stewart  JVIacnaughten, 

OF 

BITTERN    MANOR.    SOUTHAMPTON, 
This  Work  is  Dedicated 

BY 

THE  AUTHOR. 


1  our 


M639207 


COETENTS. 


CHAPTKK.  rxas. 

Introduction        -        - 9 

I.— The  Tempest 33 

II. — Bacon's  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640         -  49 
III  — Father  Paul  and  Father  Fulgentio,  Francis- 
can Friars  of  Venice      -        -        -        -        -  71 
IV. — Pan,  Dionysus  or  Bacchus,  and  Perseus  (Bacon's 
three    fables    illustrating    parabolical 
Poesy   and   Stage   Plays  in  the  '^DeAug- 

MENTIS") 82 

V. — The  Comedy  of  Errors  -        -        -        -        -        -  108 

VI. — Midsummer  Night's   Dream  and  Bacon's  Thir- 
teenth   Deficient    of    a    New   World    of 

Sciences,  or  Magia  Naturalis    -        -        -  129 

VII. — Bacon's  New  World  of  Sciences  -        -        -        -  140 

VITI.— Title    Page    Engraving    of    Advancement    of 

Learning         -------  155 

IX. — Ben  Jonson's  Discoveries  or  Explorata     -        -  161 

X. — Cipher  —  Continued     ------  169 

XL — Measure  for  Measure     ------  184 

XII. — The  Kosicrucians         - 192 

XIII. — Gorhambury  and  Verulam 212 


INTRODUCTION. 


This  work  follows  close  upon  the  heels  of  Mrs.  Henry  Pott's  re- 
markable work,  Francis  Bacon  and  His  Secret  Society.  I  venture  to 
cherish  the  hope,  some  of  the  chapters  in  this  work  of  mine,  may 
throw  fm'ther  light  upon  her  theories;  and  prove  a  humble  corollary 
to  her  book.  The  arrangement  of  my  chapters,  it  must  be  confessed, 
are  somewhat  erratic,  but  not  without  design  and  method.  The 
first  chapter  is  intended  to  point  out  the  fact,  that  there  are 
Rosicrucian  affinities  and  parallels  in  Tlie  Tempest,  showing 
the  author  of  the  plays  was  well  acquainted  with  the  Utopian 
literature,  which  finds  its  reflection  in  the  New  Atlantis.  In  the 
fact.  Bacon  corresponded  with  the  martyr.  Father  Fulgentio,  we 
obtain  a  powerful  hint  as  to  his  sympathies  with  the  Reformation, 
and  a  proof  he  was  secretly  in  communication  with  a  wide  move- 
ment abroad,  which  could  at  that  period  only  be  furthered  by  means 
of  a  secret  society  or  brotherhood.  I  am  in  hopes  my  notes  upon 
the  water-marks  in  some  of  Bacon's  works  may  throw  a  further  light 
upon. Mrs.  Pott's  plates  in  her  learned  work. 

This  work  has  been  written  to  stimulate  curiosity,  and  excite 
interest,  in  just  those  works  of  Bacon's,  which  are  hardly  known  at 
all.  I  refer  to  the  Advancement  of  Learning  of  1640,  which  is  the 
first  English  edition  of  the  De  Augmentis  of  1623.  This  valuable 
and  rare  book  is  difficult  to  obtain,  and  has  never  been  reprinted. 
It  is  really  the  only  work  of  Bacon's  which  contains  the  ground 
plan,  method  and  proportions  of  the  Instauration  as  a  whole.  It 
was  written  for  the  "  better  opening  up, "  or  unlocking  of  the 
Instauration,  which  latter  was,  I  maintain,  a  perfectly  complete  and 
developed  scheme  in  Bacon's  mind,  connected  with  the  second  half 
of  his  works  missing,  and  which  latter  are  described  as  examples  of 
inquisition  and  invention.  It  is,  indeed,  a  most  remarkable  thing, 
that  no  one,  with  the  exception  of  Delia  Bacon,  has  pointed  out,  or 
recognized  the  fact,  the  Instauration  is  not  merely  a  design  widely 
directed  toward  inductive  research  in  science  and  nature  generally, 
but  also  a  purely  creative  scheme,  perfect  in  its  apprehension,  and 
borrowed  from  the  six  days  of  Genesis,  as  a  god  in  art  might  be 


10  INTRODUCTION. 

humbly  imitating  creation.  All  Bacon's  works  massed  together, 
are  as  nothing  to  this  one  work  I  refer  to,  in  the  Distribution  Pref- 
ace of  which,  he  unlocks  his  intentions,  in  guarded  language,  but, 
nevertheless,  with  assured  confidence  of  his  designs. 

This  book  is  founded  upon  three  great  principles, — History, 
Poetry,  Philosophy,  —  which  he  respectively  terms  Memory,  Imagina- 
tion, Reason.  And  on  a  table  or  platform  of  the  design  of  the  work, 
we  find  the  entire  structure  of  the  third  principle.  Reason  or  Philos- 
ophy, emanating  and  aflShated  upon  the  former  two,  bracketed 
together  as  History  and  Poesy,  or  Memory  and  Imagination.  When 
we  further  examine  his  treatment  of  the  philosophy,  we  find  it  has 
nothing  whatever  to  do  with  metaphysics,  or  philosophy  in  its  gen- 
erally accepted  sense,  but  find  it  a  strictly  inductive  method  of  dis- 
covery, by  means  of  parallels,  analogy,  logic,  and  a  great  method  of 
ciphers,  which  are  to  deliver  the  things  invented, — whatever  they 
may  be, —  by  means  of  memory  or  recollection.  All  this  is  involved 
in  the  subtlest  possible  language,  and  has  been  written  with  two  dis- 
tinct objects, — reserve  and  secrecy, — discovery  and  penetration  of 
his  design.  His  own  words  to  Doctor  Playfer  establishes  this  fact, 
and  the  critic  who  questions  my  theory,  must  explain  why  Bacon 
wrote  this  work  first  in  English,  and  had  it  translated  into  Latin, 
reserving  the  Enghsh  version  for  a  posthumous  publication  %  Was 
he  afraid  of  a  premature  discovery  of  its  real  character  ?  Why  should 
he  write  a  work  of  this  sort  in  obscure  language?  Why,  was  it 
to  "  choose  its  reader?  "  Why  was  it  to  "  fly  too  high  over  men's 
heads?"  What  is  the  design  hidden  behind  the  fourth,  fifth  and 
^ixth  parts  of  the  Instauration  ?  It  is  quite  impossible  to  convey 
to  the  reader  any  idea  of  this  work,  unless  he  has  it  by  his  side  to 
collate  my  statements  and  study  them  further.  The  curious  part 
of  all  this  is,  even  Englishmen  well  acquainted  with  the  Two  Books 
of  the  Advancement  of  Learning  of  1605,  know  nothing,  or  next  to 
nothing;  of  the  DeAugmentis,  (Bacon's  chief  work,)  which  embraces 
the  Instauration,  as  a  whole  with  parts,  and  with  a  distinct  end  or 
aim  (by  discovery)  hidden  under  its  mispaging,  its  strange  italicizing, 
its  dark  language  and  its  inspired  character.  Critics  who  deny  any 
poetic  inclinations  to  Bacon's  mind,  seem  oblivious  of  the  astonishing 
fact  this  work  is  mainly  based  upon  poetry,  although  entitled  the 
Partitions  of  the  Sciences.  Did  Bacon  consider  poetry  a  science  ?  Yet 
he  distinctly  states  poetry,  "  to  be  a  play  of  wit, "  and  not  a  science. 
In  this  self-same  work !    It  is  not  as  the  imagination  of  the  scientific 


INTRODUCTION.  11 

mind  he  introduces  poetry,  but  as  stage-plays,  and  dramatical  or  rep- 
resentative poetry  upon  pages  106,  107,  corresponding  to  the  num- 
bers of  the  columns  of  the  comedies  and  histories  upon  which  we 
find  the  word  Bacon,  and  Francis,  twenty-one  times ! 

Another  great  mystery  pertaining  to  the  Instauration  is  its  per- 
fectly divided  character;  that  is,  it  consists  of  two  globes  or  hemi- 
spheres, compared  to  the  old  and  new  worlds.  This  book  of  the 
Advancement  of  Learning  I  refer  to,  deals  entirely  with  the  Intel- 
lectual Globe  or  New  World  of  Sciences,  of  which  we  absolutely  know 
nothing,  being  concerned  entirely  with  the  three  missing  parts  of  the 
Instauration,  generally  supposed  to  have  never  been  completed  by 
Bacon.  What  object  had  Bacon  to  veil  his  language  with  regard  to 
these  Prostermitted  Parts,  which  he  states  he  "  onlp  coasts  along  "  ? 
What  part  has  Bacon's  Wisdom  of  tM  Ancients  to  play  in  the  Instau- 
ration as  a  whole  ?  And  here,  let  me  remark,  those  critics  who  ques- 
tion Bacon's  poetic  predilections  receive  another  rebuff;  for  Bacon 
terms  this  collection,  examples  of  parabolical  poesy,  and  the  pieces 
consist  of  just  those  classic  subjects  which  the  Latin  poets, — like  Ovid, 
for  example, —  selected  for  their  poems.  Why  embrace  this  collection 
in  his  New  World  of  Sciences  f  My  object  is  to  point  out,  these 
Deficients  are  always  introduced  in  cautious,  guarded  language, 
behind  which  some  profound  design  lies  obscured.  The  human 
mind  is  so  framed  that,  unless  attention  is  directed  and  ques- 
tions asked  upon  certain  points,  it  blanches  and  passes  over 
everything  difficult,  as  if  it  did  not  exist.  The  difference  between 
perception  and  sense  (one  of  Bacon's  Deficients)  is  immense.  All 
art  is  an  appeal  to  sense,  and  the  highest  art  is  to  cheat  sense  at 
the  expense  of  perception.  Bacon  presents  us,  at  the  commence- 
ment of  his  Distribution  Preface,  }\x^t  the  sort  of  hint  we  should 
take  in  studying  his  works  and  his  designs.  He  writes :  "  For  the 
nakedness  of  the  mind,  as  once  of  the  body,  is  the  companion  of 
innocence  and  simplicity  "  (p.  22).  This  follows  on  the  heels  of  the 
statement  "  that  everything  be  delivered  with  all  possible  plainness 
and  perspicuity. "  How  are  we  to  reconcile  these  paradoxes,  which 
run  through  the  entire  work?  They  will  easily  be  understood 
directly  the  world  recognizes  the  fact  Bacon  intended  to  come  down 
invisible  to  posterity  as  a  god  in  art.  Directly  the  literary  world 
seriously  apprehends  the  nature  of  this,  the  greatest  literary 
problem  the  world  has  ever  seen,  as  the  spiritual  hidden  behind 
art,  waiting  for  us  to  interpret  it  and  to  understand  nature  by  its 


12  INTRODUCTION. 

light,  <i  thousand  unheeded  facts,  a  thousand  hints  by  parallel,  by 
cipher  and  analogy,  will  be  discovered.  For  nothing  is  spiritually 
discerned  without  faith  and  toil,  and  a  text  may  be  studied  a 
thousand  times  ere  it  yields  up  its  secret.  Just  consider  for  a 
moment  how,  only  a  few  years  ago,  Mr.  Smith  first  started  the 
theory  of  the  Bacon  authorship  of  the  plays  with  about  a  dozen 
parallels.  This  was  deemed  too  extravagant  a  theory  to 
obtain  decent  hearing,  but  was  relegated  to  that  class  of  insanity, 
allied  to  circle-squaring.  Since  then  hundreds  of  works  have  ap- 
peared, each  contributing  some  new  parallel, —  some  fresh  indica- 
tion in  the  same  direction.  "  The  cry  is,  still  they  come, "  and  they 
will  soon  arrive  so  quickly,  that  the  world  will  rub  its  eyes  and  won- 
der it  was  never  discovered  before.  That  is  the  nature  of  the 
spiritual  in  the  world,  that  we  cannot  apprehend  it,  unless  directed 
by  others  to  do  so,  or  accustomed  by  education  and  discipline  to 
search  for  it.  I  take  it,  one  of  Bacon's  complete  objects  was  to 
bring  this  lesson  directly  home  to  our  minds,  that  we  are  most 
assured  of  what  we  are  most  ignorant  of,  and  that  nature  is  infi- 
nitely more  subtle  than  the  senses  of  man.  His  doctrine  of  the  four 
idols  of  the  mind,  which  obstruct  and  confuse  the  intellect,  is  all 
part  and  parcel  of  this,  my  theory.  It  was  only  by  examples  of  art, 
and  discovery  by  posterity,  he  could  illustrate  in  full  force  his  teach- 
ing. One  of  the  idols  of  men's  minds  has  been  Shakespeare,  and  I 
think  it  highly  probable,  from  the  character  of  Bacon's  mind,  he 
foresaw  such  a  lesson  could  be  taught  on  those  points  by  self-sacri- 
fice, as  would  efi'ect  a  revolution  in  men's  ways  of  hastily  judging 
and  accepting  conclusions  upon  insufficient  grounds.  The  probability 
Shakespeare  wrote  the  plays,  does  not  fulfill  the  terms  of  a  true 
induction.  Men  have  before,  like  the  author  of  Junius,  denied  and 
obscured  their  authorship ;  tradition,  like  authority,  is  a  mere  idol 
of  the  understanding,  which  has  enslaved  men's  minds  for  hundreds 
of  years  in  every  department  of  thought,  in  religion,  government, 
society,  science,  and  still  rules  the  intellect  as  a  form  shapes  a  soft 
substance.  It  has  been  said  ''  Give  a  lie  a  quarter  of  an  hour's  start 
and  who  shall  overtake  it  I"  But  what  of  those  lies  branded  in  for 
centuries  from  father  to  son,  from  generation  to  generation !  Prej- 
udice in  everything,  that  is  the  nature  of  human  thought.  There 
is  only  one  education  worthy  of  the  name,  and  that  is  allied  to  inde- 
pendence and  freedom  of  the  intellect.  Shelley  rightly  declared  half 
his^  life  had  been  spent  in  unlearning  what  he  had  been  taught. 


INTRODUCTION.  13 

There  is  only  one  word  for  all  this,  it  is  slavery  of  the  intellect  — 
summed  up  in  the  old  proverb,  "  To  cure  the  ears  is  most  difficult ! " 
Bacon,  I  submit,  knew  very  well,  that  all  the  writing  in  the  world 
would  not  cure  this  ingrained  evil,  nor  could  it  be  cured  by  any  per- 
saasions.  Examples,  by  means  of  art,  are  quite  on  a  different  platform 
—  and  that  is  what  he  intended  to  illustrate  by. 

With  regard  to  the  Comedy  of  Errors,  and  Midsummer  Nighfs 
Dream,  it  is  just  here  the  critic  will  fall  upon  me.  But  I  beg  to 
state,  my  chapters  on  those  two  plays  are  merely  written  in  a  spirit 
of  humble  suggestion,  and  require  each  a  volume  to  themselves 
instead  of  a  few  brief  pages.  Because  I  have  not  made  out  my  case 
with  regard  to  my  theories,  in  a  complete  or  satisfatory  fashion,  it 
does  not  follow  somebody  else  may  not  better  my  instructions.  The 
Dream  is  the  profoundest  play  ever  penned,  and  is  as  philosophical 
as  nature  itself,  and  I  am  convinced  that  the  fairy  element  has  been 
intended  to  represent  the  occult,  invisible  spiritual  powers  behind 
the  curtain  of  nature's  theatre, — in  short,  the  magical,  or  rather 
the  intellectual  in  nature. 

With  regard  to  the  Rosicrucians,  I  wish  to  say  I  do  not  intro- 
duce this  subject  from  a  vulgar  desire  to  appear  to  know  more  than 
I  do  know,  or  from  the  impostor's  standpoint  of  mysticism.  Th^re 
is  excellent  evidence  of  various  kinds,  some  published  already,  some 
unpublished  and  most  important,  that  Bacon  was  the  head  of  the 
brotherhood.  And  I  am  advancing  and  pushing  a  theory  that 
admits  the  approval  of  such  authorities  as  Mrs.  Henry  Pott,  the  Hon. 
Ignatius  Donnelly,  and  even  criticism  has  gone  so  far  as  to  allow,  the 
cipher  problem  stands  or  falls  with  the  allied  theory  of  the  Rosicru- 
cian  source  of  the  plays.  ["  Notes  and  Queries,  ^^  on^^  Bacon,  Shake- 
speare and  the  Rosicrucians. "]  I  held  the  intention  of  publishing  in 
this  work  certain  evidence,  which  would,  I  am  convinced,  establish 
the  theory  on  firm  ground  once  and  forever.  But  as  I  am  running 
great  risk  of  losing  whatever  is  of  importance  in  this  work  by  pi- 
racy, or  clever  forestatement  by  theft,  I  shall  wait  before  I  place 
all  my  eggs  in  one  basket.  It  is  the  interest  of  all  literary  people 
taking  some  intellectual  pleasure  in  this  problem,  to  see  justice  is 
done  to  an  author's  claims  whilst  going  through  the  press.  These 
sort  of  things  cannot  be  kept  quiet,  and  everybody  knows, 
when  two  claims  to  the  same  discovery,  upon  such  a  recondite 
problem,  spring  up  together,  at  the  same  moment  (though  it  be  even 
in  distant  places),  some  sort  of  direct  or  indirect  plagiarism,  or, 


14  INTRODUCTION. 

rather,  theft,  has  been  going  on.  Those  who  cannot  discover  for 
themselves  anything  in  this  problem,  feed  their  malice  by  discount- 
ing the  discoveries  of  others.  But  all  right-minded  people,  and 
literary  men  of  honor,  who  recognize  the  risks,  labors  and  difficulties 
attending  publication  of  these  cipher  mysteries,  know  very  well 
whence  stolen  property  comes  from.  The  reader  cannot  believe 
me  so  simple  as  not  to  be  aware  my  claims  to  my  own  discoveries 
maybe  questioned,  and  my  chief  enemy  may  be  my  own  labors.  It 
is  hard  to  be  forestalled  and  ridiculed  where  one  should  be  pro- 
tected, but  I  am  not  the  sole  person  interested  in  this  matter,  but 
all  who  come  after  me.  It  is  easy  to  devise  expedients  to  meet  the 
evil,  such  as  typewriting  and  copyriglit  thereon,  but  this  cannot 
checkmate  any  unscrupulous  person  setting  up  counterclaims  by 
proxy  in  other  countries  or  in  Europe.  Besides,  these  things,  like 
ill-fame,  travel  fast,  and  the  world,  at  first  cynical  and  incredu- 
lous, dubs  the  same  person  fool,  who,  a  moment  before,  was 
called  an  impostor.  I  say,  I  have  well  weighed  and  fore- 
seen all  this,  but  in  spite  of  it  all,  I  accept  the  sacrifice,  if  so 
it  be,  with  the  example  of  Francis  Bacon  before  me,  who  toiled 
on  without  a  hope  of  earthly  reward  for  the  sake  of  humanity. 

Here  let  me  remark,  the  study  of  Bacon's  works  is  a  very 
serious  task,  and  requires  infinite  more  patience,  toil  and  loving 
attention  than  can  be  adequately  even  suggested.  There  are  per- 
sons and  even  students,  who  imagine  once  they  have  read  a  few 
times  Bacon's  Essays,  two  books  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning, 
1605;  History  of  King  Henry  the  Seventh,  and  otherwise  peeped 
into  his  Natural  History,  imagine  they  are  in  a  position  to  form 
opinions  upon  Lord  Bacon's  ends  and  aims,  and  decide  ex  cathedra, 
upon  the  problem  and  mystery  of  the  plays.  I  am  sorry  to  say 
there  are  even  persons  who  arrogate  to  themselves  the  position  in 
England  of  being  representative  Baconian  men,  who  may  be  in- 
cluded in  this  category.  Anybody  professing  to  understand  the 
Instauration  without  knowledge  of  the  De  Augmentis  (and  particu- 
larly of  its  translation,  1640,  which  dififers  from  it),  maybe  com- 
pared to  one  studying  Hamlet  with  the  Prince  left  out.  As 
Kuno  Fischer  states,  the  De  Augmentis  (1623),  is  the  ground  plan 
of  the  Instauration,  and  explains  Bacon's  scheme  as  a  whole.  Yet 
there  are  men  who  have  never  read  Bacon's  De  Augmentis,  and 
never  seen  the  Advancement  of  Learning  of  1640  (which  they  con- 


INTEODUCTION.  15 

fuse  frequently  with  the  two  books  of  1605),   who,    nevertheless, 
imagine  they  are  familiar  with  Bacon's  works. 

Again,  very  few  people  are  aware  that  each  edition  of  Bacon's 
Essays  differ  as  to  text.  The  editions  of  these  Essays  began 
1597,  1607,  1612,  1625,  1638,  and  all  these  five  editions  vary,  —there 
being  nineteen  hundred  alterations  in  five,  six  or  even  seven  diflfer- 
ent  editions.  To  study  this  sole  branch  would  be  a  very  serious  and 
laborious  matter,  yet  without  a  perfectly  exhaustive  collation  of 
these  several  editions,  with  the  plays,  no  one  can  say  he  knows 
Bacon.  Another  man  will  think,  if  he  possesses  Spedding  &  Ellis' 
excellent  edition  of  Bacon's  works,  he  is  fortified  with  all  that  is 
needful,  —  quite  and  utterly  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  Spedding's 
edition  leaves  out  entirely  a  great  number  of  Bacon's  posthumous 
pieces,  and  what  it  does  give  is  presented  in  a  mangled  and  mutilated 
form ;  besides,  for  cipher  discoveries,  these  works  are  useless.  Even 
the  Latin  text  of  many  works  by  Bacon  materially  differs  from  the 
English  version ;  that  is,  a  great  deal  may  be  gathered  from  one 
which  cannot  be  from  the  other.  For  example,  of  the  Fourth  Part 
of  the  Instauration  missing  (which  was  to  consist  of  types  and 
models  of  invention  as  examples  in  certain  subjects,  to  which  the 
Baconian  logic  was  to  be  applied),  how  much  is  learned  by  the 
Latin  text.  Bacon  using  the  word  Plasmata  to  express  models. 
Plasmata  appears  to  be  a  word  connected  with  models  formed  in 
wax  or  clay  and  to  be  thus  connected  with  the  potter's  wheel. 

The  theory  I  have  held  all  along,  and  which  I  am  convinced 
will  prove  ultimately  the  right  one,  is  that  the  true  direction  to 
search  for  proof  of  the  authorship  of  the  plays,  is  in  Lord  Bacon's 
works,  in  conjunction  or  marriage  with  the  plays.  The  idea  that 
Bacon  (if  he  wrote  these  plays),  should  have  planned  nothing  in  con- 
nection with  them  of  a  key  nature,  or  as  explanatory  of  his  rightful 
claim  as  author  is  absurd.  If  these  plays  are  not  bound  up  with  the 
entire  Instauration,  it  is  useless  to  imagine  a  cipher  exists  alone  in 
the  1623  folio.  The  greatest  and  most  conclusive  proof  of  Bacon's 
authorship  of  these  plays,  is  to  find  collusions,  parallels  and  cipher 
congruities  between  them  and  his  prose  or  acknowledged  works. 
The  particular  work  of  Bacon's  to  study,  is  therefore  the  one  contain- 
ing the  ground  plan  and  entire  scheme  of  the  Instauration  as  a 
whole.  That  is  embraced  and  contained  solely  in  the  Latin  Dd 
Augmentis,  published  the  same  year  as  the  plays,  1623,  and  con- 
tains not  only  a  rational  inductive  design,  based  on  poetry  and 


16  INTRODUCTION. 

history,  but  is  largely  made  up  of  a  great  book  of  secret  methods  of 
the  delivery,  or  discovery  of  knowledge,  by  means  of  ciphers.  The 
Latin  version  was  originally  written  by  Bacon  in  English  and  trans- 
lated into  Latin  by  Doctor  Playfer  and  others.  Bacon,  during  his 
lifetime,  never  gave  the  world  the  original  English  edition.  But 
after  his  death,  in  IGiO,  a  supposed  translation  of  the  Latin  is  issued 
under  the  auspices  of  the  University  of  Oxford,  and  with  a  declaration, 
under  the  frontispiece  portrait  of  Bacon,  that  the  Universities  had 
fulfilled  (in  publishing  this  English  edition)  a  vow  promised  {voto 
suscepto),  to  the  author  living  ( vivus).  This  work  bears  in  every  line 
evidence  of  Bacon's  unique  and  profound  style.  It  is  largely  mis- 
paged,  and  experts  upon  printing  assert  this  mispaging  could  not 
have  been  accidental.  There  is  little  doubt  from  ^he  translator's 
preface,  it  was  written  by  Bacon  himself,  and  reserved  for  safety's 
sake,  for  a  posthumous  publication.  It  is  therefore  the  most  impor- 
tant work  Bacon  ever  wrote,  and  I  hold  it  is  the  key-work  to  the 
entire  Instauration,  as  well  as  to  the  authorship  of  the  plays.  Upon 
the  second  title  page  we  find  this  motto,  which  is  a  profound  hint 
for  the  mathematical  and  orderly  disposition  of  the  work,  in  relation 
to  subject  matter  and  secret  cipher : 

"  Deus  omnia 

In  mensura,  et  numero  et  ordine 

Disposuit. " 

This  is  borrowed  from  Solomon,  and  signifies,  the  author  (like  the 
Almighty  Architect  of  the  universe)  has  "  disposed  all  things  in 
proportion,  number  and  order. ''^ 

One  of  Bacon's  Deficients  of  A  New  World  of  Sciences  is  entitled, 
Georgics  of  the  Mind,  and  deals  with  the  basis  of  the  drama  motive, 
that  is,  ethic  rightly  employed,  in  tragedy  and  comedy.  This  is  to 
be  found  in  his  seventh  book  of  his  D3  Augmentis,  and  described  in 
these  words : 

*'  We  will  briefly  re-examine  and  endeavor  to  open  and  clear 
the  springs  of  moral  habits,  before  we  come  into  the  doctrine  of  the 
Culture  or  Manurance  of  the  Mind,  which  we  set  down  as 
Deficient."  (p.  337,  Lib.  VII.,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 

Throughout  the  plays  we  find  a  vast  collection  of  metaphors, 
applied  to  character,  in  an  agricLiltural  sense  as  weeds,  herbs,  etc., 
which  I  have  pointed  out  in  my  last  work,  Francis  Bacon.  Parallel 
the  above  with  this  from  Hamlet : 


INTRODUCTION.  17 

Hamlet.    Confess  yourself  to  heaven ; 
Repent  what's  past;  avoid  what  is  to  come, 
And  do  not  spread  the  compost  on  the  weeds, 
To  make  them  ranker. 

(Hamlet,  act  iii.  4.) 

A  work  might  be  filled  to  illustrate  these  Georgics  of  the  Mind, 
applied  in  the  plays  to  virtue  and  vice,  and  it  is  evident  Bacon 
borrow^ed  this  idea  and  title  from  Virgil's  Georgics,  which  are  dedi- 
cated to  Ceres,  Apollo,  and  Bacchus,  the  classical  protagonists  of 
the  drama.  It  is  just  these  Deficients  which  we  are  to  work  out  in 
harmony  with  the  interpretation  of  the  plays,  and  which  I  intro- 
duce here  as  an  example  of  the  connection  between  Bacon's  New 
World  of  Sciences  and  his  Instauration  as  a  whole.  The  dramatic 
or  classical  bias  of  Bacon's  mind  is  made  evident  by  a  thousand 
parallels.  For  example,  the  fifth  and  sixth  centuries  of  Bacon's 
Sylva  Sylvarum,  or  Natural  History,  deal  with  trees,  plants  and 
vegetables,  and  are  evidently  in  touch  with  Virgil's  second  Georgic, 
dedicated  to  Bacchus  or  Dionysus,  the  protagonist  of  the  drama, 
upon  arboriculture : 

Nunc  te,  Bacche,  canam,  nee  non  Silvestria  tecum 
Virgulta  et  prolem  tarde  crescentis  Olivse.  (2.) 

It  is  highly  probable  Bacon's  title,  Sylva  Sylvarum  (or  Wood  of 
Woods),  is  borrowed  from  this  Georgic.  I  hope  in  my  next  work  to 
be  able  to  prove  Bacon's  Sylva  Sylvarum,  is  the  Deficient  entitled 
a  Mechanical  History,  and  is  really  a  great  cipher  commentary  or 
dictionary  in  collusion  with  the  plays,  and  constructed  of  endless 
particulars,  all  in  inductive  connection  with  each  other  and  the 
folio  1623  text.  It  is  this  work,  I  take  it,  which  is  really  also 
understood  under  the  Deficient  Venatio  Panis  or  Literate 
Experience.  There  are  one  thousand  experiments  numbered  in  the 
natural  history  by  Bacon.  I  have  sufficiently  proved  (for  myself, )  the 
numbers  of  some  of  the  experiments,  are  in  cipher  touch  with 
the  text  in  the  plays.  But  this  is  too  subtle  and  too  elaborate  a 
theory  to  do  more  than  just  hint  at  here,  nor  can  I  afford  space  to 
illustrate,  at  present,  this  discovery. 

The  two  illustrations  given  in  this  work,  represent  Temple  House, 
Gorhambury  Park,  Hertfordshire,  as  it  once  existed,  and  as  it  now 
stands,  a  mere  ruin.  This  house  was  built  by  Sir  Nicholas  Bacon, 
father  of  the  illustrious  chancellor,  about  the  date  1564,  and  it  was 
here  Queen  Ehzabeth  was  wont  to  pay  her  Lord  Keeper  visits,  on 


18  INTRODUCTION. 

one  occasion  of  which,  Francis  Bacon  being  asked  "by  the  Queen  his 
age,  rephed, "  He  was  so  many  years  younger  than  her  Majesty's  happy 
reign."  The  house  was  constructed,  tradition  reports,  out  of  the 
stones  of  the  ruins  of  the  old  Abbey  of  Saint  Albans,  and  it  was 
reduced  to  its  present  condition  when  the  house  of  the  existing 
family, — the  Lords  Grimston,  was  constructed  in  the  years  1775- 
1778.  The  illustration,  representing  its  perfect  state,  is  taken  from 
an  old  history  of  Hertfordshire,  bearing  date  a  few  years  previous 
to  its  destruction. 

The  preseent  ruin  is  hardly  recognizable  in  the  illustration  of 
the  house  as  it  once  proudly  stood.  The  reason  for  this  is  explained 
by  the  circumstance,  that  the  chief  parts  now  left  standing,  consti- 
tuted the  inner  side  of  a  court,  or  quadrangle  within  the  main  build- 
ing, on  the  right  side  of  the  perfect  engraving.  These  are  the  ruins 
of  a  hall,  and  a  lofty  octagonal  tower,  which  are  all  that  remain  of 
the  one  seen  in  the  other  picture  in  a  complete  state.  This  hall, 
appears  from  Aubrey's  manuscripts,  to  have  been  richly  ornamented 
in  the  splendid  style  of  the  age.  Aubrey  describes  this  hall,  as  hav- 
ing '*  a  large  story,  very  well  painted,  of  the  feast  of  the  Gods, 
where  Mars  is  caught  in  a  net  by  Vulcan.  On  the  wall  over  the 
chimney  is  painted  an  oak,  with  acorns  falUng  from  it,  with  the 
words  Nisi  quid  potius;  and  on  the  wall  over  the  table  is  painted, 
Ceres  teaching  the  sowing  of  corn,  with  the  words  Moniti  Meliora.^^ 
In  the  garden,  close  to  the  house,  was  a  statue  of  Orpheus,  and  one 
of  King  Henry  VIII.,  part  of  the  latter,  but  without  a  head,  still 
remaining.  The  wall  in  which  the  statue  of  King  Henry  VIII.  stood, 
formed  part  of  a  noble  piazza  or  portico,  and  can  be  distinctly  seen 
in  the  complete  illustration  of  the  unruined  mansion,  on  the  left, 
indicated  by  a  succession  of  niches  or  recesses.  The  ruins  are  situ- 
ated upon  an  eminence,  commanding  a  noble  prospect  of  the  park, 
which  is  richly  covered  with  fine  timber, —  a  remarkable  old  oak 
tree,  hollow  from  age,  known  as  the  'Kissoak,^  standing  within  a  few 
hundred  yards  of  the  remains.  A  more  beautiful  or  more  romantic 
site  than  this  is  not  to  be  found  in  all  England,  quite  independently 
of  its  historical  associations  as  the  home  of  Francis  Bacon. 

There  are  a  considerable  number  of  trifles  in  the  1623  folio  plays, 
showing  the  writer  was  well  acquainted  with  both  the  history  and 
neighborhood  of  Saint  Albans,  Lord  Bacon's  home.  For  example, 
in  the  second  part  of  King  Henry  the  Sixth,  we  find  the  death  of  the 
Duke  of  Somerset  at  the  battjle  of  Saint  Albans,  underneath  an 


INTRODUCTION.  19 

^^  Ale-house' paltry  sign,  the  Castle  in  St.  Albans.''^  The  duke  had 
heeu  warned  to  beware  of  castles,  and  the  prophecy  is  fuhilled  by 
his  death  at  St.  Albans,  underneath  an  ale-house,  whose  sign  was 
that  of  the  Castle. 

Richard.    So  lie  thou  there, 
For  underneath  an  Ale-house  paltry  sign. 

The  Castle  in  St.  Albans, Somerset 

Hath  made  the  wizard  famous  in  his  death. 

{2  King  Henry  VI.,  act  v.  so.  2.) 

This  is  a  trifle  which  reveals  local  knowledge ;  so  also  does  the 
play  of  Cymbeline,  whose  coins  have  been  abundantly  unearthed 
upon  the  site  of  ancient  Verulam. 

In  Camden's  Brittania  he  writes  {Conjecture  upon  British  Coins), 
describing  certain  early  British  coins,  of  which  there  are  plates : 

*'  The  first  is  Cunobelins,  who  flourished  under  Augustus  and 
Tiberius,  upon  which  (if  I  mistake  not)  are  engraven  the  heads  of 
a  two-faced  Janus  ;  possibly  because  at  that  time  Britain  began  to 
be  a  little  refined  from  its  barbarity.  The  second,  likewise,  is 
CuNOBELiNS,  with  his  face  and  name;  and  on  the  reverse,  the 
mint-master,  with  the  addition  of  the  word  Tascia,  which  in 
British  signifies  a  tribute-penny  (as  I  am  informed  by  D.  David 
Powel,  a  man  admirably  skilled  in  that  language),  perhaps  from 
the  Latin  taxatio,  for  the  Britain s  do  not  use  the  letter  X.  The 
third  is  also  the  same  Cunobelins,  with  a  horse  and  Cuno,  and 
with  an  ear  of  corn  and  Camr,  which  seems  to  stand  for  Cama- 
LODUNUM,  the  palace  of  Cunobelin.  The  fourth,  by  the  Ver,  seems 
to  have  been  coined  at  Verulam.  The  fifth,  likewise,  is  Cunobelins. 
The  seventh,  which  is  Cunobelins,  with  this  inscription,  Tase 
Novanei,  with  a  woman's  head,  I  dare  not  positively  affirm  to 
have  been  the  tribute-money  of  the  Trinovantes,  who  were  under 
his  government;  Apollo,  with  his  harp,  and  the  name  of  Cunobelin 
on  the  reverse,  being  to  my  mind  what  I  have  somewhere  observed 
of  the  god  Belinus ;  namely,  that  the  ancient  Gauls  worshipped 
Apollo  under  the  name  of  Belinus.  And  this  is  confirmed  by 
Bioscorides,  who  expressly  says  that  the  Herba  Apollinaris  (in  the 
juice  whereof  the  Gauls  used  to  dip  their  arrows)  was  called  in 
Gaulish  Belinuntia.  From  which  I  durst  almost  make  this  infer- 
ence, that  the  name  of  Cunobelin,  as  also  of  that  of  Cassibelan, 
came  originally  from  the  worship  of  Apollo,  as  well  as  Phcebitius 
and  Delphidius.  The  twentieth  is  of  Cunobeline,  son  of  Theo- 
mantius,  nephew  to  Cassibelan,  by  the  British  writers  called  Kymbo- 
LiNE.    (pp.  Ixxxviii.  xciii.) 

How  closely  the  author  of  the  play  of  Cymbeline  had  studied  all 


20  INTRODUCTION. 

this,  may  be  inferred  from  the  allusions  to  the  tribute  money,  to  be 
paid  the  Romans,  to  be  found  in  the  text : 

Cymheline.    Well ; 
My  peace  we  will  begin.    And,  Cains  Lucius, 
Although  the  victor,  we  submit  to  Caesar, 
And  to  the  Roman  empire,  promising 
To  pay  our  tvonted  tribute.     (Act  v.) 

Cym.    Now  say,  what  would  Augustus  Csesar  with  us  ? 

Luc.    When  Julius  Caisar,  whose  remembrance  yet 
Lives  in  men's  eyes  and  will  to  ears  and  tongues 
Be  theme  and  hearing  ever,  was  in  this  Britain 
And  conquer'd  it,  Cassibelan,  thine  uncle, — 
Famous  in  Csesar's  praises,  no  whit  less 
Than  in  his  feats  deserving  it, —  for  him 
And  his  succession  granted  Rome  a  tribute. 
Yearly  three  thousand  pounds,  which  by  thee  lately 
Is  left  untender'd.     (Act  iii.  sc.  1.) 

In  The  Gossiping  Guide  to  St.  Albans,  by  Charles  Henry  Ash- 
down,  F.  R.  G.  S.  (1891),  describing  the  ancient  city  of  Yerulam,  or 
Verolanium : 

"  It  is  believed  that  the  ancient  Britons  lived  on  this  spot  for 
many  centuries  before  Christ;  they  built  a  town,  dug  the  ditch,  put 
up  palisades  where  those  walls  are,  made  covered  ways  out  of  it  for 
their  cattle,  and  were  reigned  over  by  many  princes,  whose  coins 
we  find  in  the  soil,  one  of  whom  was  the  Cymbeline  of  Shakespeare. " 
(p.  24.) 

This  is  endorsed  by  the  word  '^  Ver  "  found  upon  one  side,  and 
"  Tascia  ''  on  the  other,  of  Camden's  fourth  coin. 
Mr.  W^alker  writes  of  Camden's  first  coin  and  plate: 

"  I  am  not  satisfied  in  the  first  of  Mr.  Camden.  If  it  be  a  Janus, 
I  had  rather  apply  it  to  the  shutting  of  Janus^  temple  by  Augustus, 
in  wJiose  time  Cunobeline  lived  at  Borne ;  and  both  himself  and  the 
Britains  were  benefited  by  that  general  peace. "    (xcii.) 

Now  this  is  indeed  very  remarkable,  and  may  account  for  the 
apparent  anachronism  of  the  introduction  of  Jupiter  in  the  play. 
It  may  be  noted  Posthumus  goes  to  Borne.  The  play  concludes  with 
repeated  references  to  peace  : 

Cym.  Laud  we  the  gods ; 

And  let  our  crooked  smokes  climb  to  their  nostrils  - 
From  our  blest  altars.    Publish  we  this  peace 
To  all  our  subjects.    Set  we  forward:  let 
A  Roman  and  a  British  ensign  wave 
Friendly  together  :  so  through  Lud's-town  march : 


INTRODUCTION.  21 

And  in  the  temple  of  great  Jupiter 

Our  peace  we'll  ratify  ;  seal  it  with  feasts. 

Set  on  there  !    Never  was  a  war  did  cease, 

Ere  bloody  hands  were  wash'd,  with  such  a  peace. 

(Act  V.) 

It  seems  pretty  certain  the  author  was  well  acquainted  with  the 
exact  history  of  King  Cymbehne  and  the  shutting  of  the  temple  of 
Janus.    The  same  writer  adds : 

"  The  twentieth  coin  is  of  Cunobehne,  son  of  Theomantius, 
nephew  to  Cassebelan ;  by  the  British  writers  called  Kymboline  (or 
Cymbeline),  on  the  reverse  a  Sphnix,  a  figure  so  acceptable  to 
Augustus  that  he  engraved  it  upon  his  seal."  (lb.) 

The  student  may  observe  how  the  play  of  Cymbeline  lays 
between  Rome  and  Britain,  with  frequent  introductions  of  Augustus 
Caesar. 

I  may,  I  suppose,  deliver  myself  of  a  conjecture,  which  recom- 
mends itself  to  my  imagination  ?  It  is,  that  Bacon  selected  this 
period,  and  this  king,  as  fit  subjects  for  a  terminal  play,  with  the 
object  of  bringing  his  art  into  touch  with  the  classical  world,  of 
which,  indeed,  it  is  a  restoration.  Ben  Jonson  recognized  this,  and 
moreover,  I  think  Cymbeline  not  only  brings  the  play  locally  home  to 
Bacon,  but  stands  as  a  representative  Apollo,  affiliating  England 
with  Italy  and  Rome  in  the  past. 

In  the  chapel  of  Sopwell  Nunnery,  St.  Albans,  Henry  VIII.  and 
the  unfortunate  Anne  Boleyn  were  privately  married,  at  least  so 
says  tradition.  This  Sopwell  Nunnery  was  founded  by  Geoffrey.de 
Gorham  (whose  abbey  gave  its  name  to  Bacon's  ancestral  seat, 
Gorhambury  Park),  sixteenth  abbot  of  St.  Albans.  In  the  play  of 
King  Henry  VIII.  may  be  found  introduced  Dunstable  and 
Ampthill,  two  neighboring  towns, — the  former  about  six  miles 
from  St.  Albans, —  showing  local  knowledge  on  the  poet's  part. 
Not  only  (as  has  already  been  pointed  out  by  others)  did  Wolsey 
afford  Bacon  a  perfect  parallel  for  his  own  disgrace  and  fall,  but  in 
the  fact,  he  was  endowed  as  Abbot  and  Prelate  of  Saint  Albans, 
was  locally,  so  to  speak,  associated  with  the  poet.  The  two  salient 
features  of  the  play  of  King  Henry  the  Eighth  are  the  rise  and  fall 
of  Anne  Boleyn  and  Cardinal  Wolsey,  both  of  these  historical 
characters  being  curiously  associated  with  St.  Albans.  Then, 
again,  what  an  enormous  local  interest  gathers  about  Saint  Albans 
in  the  War  of  the  Roses,  two  of  its  most  famous  battles  being  fought 
within  the  town.    And  all  this  we  find  reproduced  in  the  Chronicle 


22  INTRODUCTION. 

Plays,  St.  Albans  being  introduced  as  the  scene  of  the  miracle  worked 
by  good  Duke  Humphry,  Duke  of  Gloucester,  who  was  buried  in 
the  Abbey.  The  only  incidents  relating  to  Warwickshire  in  the 
plays,  are  the  allusions  to  Sir  Thomas  Lucy  of  Charlecote  Park,  in 
The  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  and  to  Wilmecote  in  the  Taming  of 
the  Shrew.  But  it  is  not  generally  known  Bacon  was  cousin  to  the 
Lucy  family,  some  letters  written  to  Sir  Thomas  Lucy  by  Bacon 
being  extant.  And  with  regard  to  the  reference  to  Wilmecote  put 
in  Christopher  Sly's  mouth  (in  the  Taming  of  the  Shrew),  it  is  plain 
Sly  is  a  portrait  of  an  impostor,  set  up  to  personate  a  nobleman,  as 
a  jest,  in  relationship  to  actors.  The  references  to  Warwickshire, 
put  in  Sly's  mouth,  are,  I  maintain,  fine  touches  of  local  coloring 
probably  pointing  at  Shakespeare  and  to  the  traditions  which  say  he, 
had  an  acquaintance  by  name  of  Sly.  But  is  it  likely  Shakespeare 
would  recall  these  incidents  of  his  own  life,  or  introduce  a  drunken 
peasant,  like  Sly,  as  a  portrait  of  himself? 

A  volume  might  be  written  to  show  the  author  of  the  Plays,  was 
a  man  who  had  been  educated  and  saturated  not  only  in  classical 
learning,  and  in  courtly  society,  but  evidently  was  acquainted  with 
state-craft,  and  possessed  that  wide  political  view  of  government 
only  to  be  gathered  from  the  society  of  statesmen,  all  of  which  it  is 
unlikely  the  circumstances  of  Shakespeare's  life  could  furnish  or 
allow  of. 

There  can  be  little  doubt  the  poet  associated  himself  with  the 
imagery  of  the  Swan.    Ben  Jonson  wrote : 

Sweet  Swan  of  Avon !    What  a  sight  it  were 
To  see  thee  in  our  water  yet  appear, 
And  make  those  flights  upon  the  hanks  of  Thames 
That  so  did  take  Eliza  and  our  James. 

(Folio  1623.) 

The  Globe  Theatre,  where  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  were  acted, 
stood  near  Blackfriars,  close  to  the  banks  of  the  Thames,  and  in  the 
following  passage  from  Bacon,  may  be  perceived  not  only  a  profound 
allusion  to  the  Swan,  but  to  some  river  also,  as  a  hint  possibly  for 
the  theatre  near  it.    Bacon  opens  this  subject  as  follows : 

'^  As  for  lives,  when  I  think,  thereon,  1  do  find  strange  that  these 
our  times  have  so  little  known,  and  acknowledged  their  own  virtues; 
being  there  is  so  seldom  any  memorials  or  records  of  the  lives  of 
those  who  have  been  eminent  in  our  times.  For  although  kings 
and  such  as  have  absolute  sovereignty  may  be  few:  and  princes  in 
free  commonwealths  are  not  many;  yet,  however,  there  hath  not 
been  wanting  excellent  men  (though  living  under  kings)  that  have 


INTRODUCTION.  23 

deserved  better,  than  an  uncertain  and  wandering  fame  of  their 
memories,  or  some  barren  and  naked  eulogy.  For  herein  the  inven- 
tion of  one  of  the  late  poets,  whereby  he  hath  well  enriched  the 
ancient  fiction,  is  not  inelegant.  He  feigns  that  at  the  thread  of 
every  man's  life,  there  was  a  medal  or  tablet,  whereon  the  name  of 
the  dead  was  stamped ;  and  that  time  waited  upon  the  shears  of  the 
fatal  sister,  and  as  soon  as  the  thread  was  cut,  caught  the  medals, 
and  carrying  them  away,  a  little  after  threw  them  out  of  his  bosom 
into  the  river  Lethe.  And  that  about  the  bank  there  were  many 
birds  flying  up  and  down  that  would  get  the  medals ;  and  after  they 
had  carried  them  in  their  beaks  a  little  while,  soon  after,  through 
negligence  suffered  them  to  fall  into  the  river.  Amongst  those  birds 
there  were  a  few  swans  found,  which  if  they  got  a  medal  with  a  name 
they  used  to  carry  it  to  a  certain  temple  consecrated  to  immortality. 
But  such  swans  are  rare  in  our  age. " 

(p.  96,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640. 

There  can  be  very  little  doubt  to  an  unprejudiced  and  reflective 
mind,  Bacon  is  presenting  us  in  this  passage,  a  profound  hint  for  the 
memory  and  records  of  one  who  was  eminent  in  his  own  times,  as  yet 
to  be  written.  This  image,  Bacon  presents  jis  of  the  Swan  is  the 
most  tremendous  hint  possible  for  Poetry,  seeing  Swans  were  sacred 
to  Apollo,  the  God  of  Poetry  and  Song.  It  was  for  this  reason  Ben 
Jonson  terms  Shakespeare  ^^  Sweet  Swan  of  Avon.''"'  But  let  the 
reader  study  the  entire  passage  cited,  and  what  does  he  find  ?  He 
will  perceive  the  entire  extract  turns  upon  the  oblivion  suffered  by 
names  (or  title  rights)  stamped  upon  medals,  which  others  got  hold 
of  and  carried  about  a  little  while.  The  whole  of  the  passage  cited 
points  at  some  difficulty,  connected  with  the  rescue  of  the  name  and 
fame  of  some  poet  from  oblivion.  '^Will  somebody  assist  us  as  to 
whom  Bacon  refers,  with  regard  to  the  invention  of  one  of  the  late 
poets  f  " 

With  regard  to  my  chapter  upon  Measure  for  Measure  I  desire  to 
remark,  I  have  only  just  touched  lightly  a  subject  which  requires  a 
volume  to  itself.  To  illustrate  my  thesis  fully  would  necessitate  a 
vast  number  of  quotations  from  Bacon's  religious  and  moral  writings, 
all  of  which  would  go  to  show  he  was  a  cabalist,  and  held  profound 
and  mystic  tenets  concerning  creation,  the  fall  of  man  and  the  first 
sin.  No  enlightened  or  educated  person  in  these  days  understands 
the  parable  of  the  temptation  and  fall  literally,  or  otherwise  than  a 
parable ;  and  to  those  who  may  consider  my  theories  extravagant,  I 
say,  read  St.  Augustine's  fifteenth  book  of  the  City  of  God  upon  this 
subject,  and  Sir  Thomas  Brown's  Enquiries  into  Vulgar  Errors ; 
and  even  such  modern  writers  as  Madame  Blavatsky,  in  her  Secret 


24  INTRODUCTION. 

Doctrine,  inculcates  similar  doctrines.  Bacon  undoubtedly  held 
peculiar  views  upon  this  subject,  and  considered  the  occasion  of  the 
fall  to  have  been  a  moral  lapse. 

Bacon  writes : 

"  It  was  that  proud  and  imperative  appetite  of  moral  knowledge, 
with  an  intent  in  man  to  revolt  from  God,  and  to  give  laws  unto 
himself,  which  was  indeed  one  project  of  the  primitive  temptation.  ^^ 
(page  18  Preface  Instauration.) 

Those  who  are  acquainted  with  that  profoundly  learned  work 
of  the  Secret  Doctrine,  by  Madame  Blavatsky,  will  there  find  incul- 
cated something  very  akin  to  this,  viz.,  that  the  state  of  man  on 
earth  has  not  always  been  what  it  is  now;  that  there  was  a  time, 
prior  to  the  fall,  when  the  continuation  of  the  human  race 
rested  on  different  principles ;  that  man  took  upon  himself  to  be 
his  own  creative  God,  and  to  depend  entirely  on  himself,  and  that 
this  was  the  fall. 

There  are  certain  points  with  regard  to  Bacon's  religious  and 
moral  views,  which  may  seem  contradicted  by  my  theory  of  the  class- 
ical tendencies  and  teachings  I  postulate,  applied  to  the  plays,  and 
suggesting  heathen  opinions.  But  I  take  it,  these  seemingly  op- 
posed views  are  theosophically  reconcilable,  seeing  that  the  restora- 
tion of  the  Gnosis  of  antiquity  has  for  object  a  grand  synthesis  of 
principle,  which  underlaid  the  classical  mysteries  just  as  much  as  it 
did  Christianity.  The  Gnosis  is  that  secret  knowledge,  or  doctrine 
concerning  the  soul,  and  origin  of  man,  which  has  existed  from  the 
hoariest  antiquity,  and  which  has  been  overlaid  and  obscured  by 
parables  or  allegory,  ceremony  and  forms,  traditions  and  denomina- 
tions. It  can  be  distinctly  traced  to  the  East,  going  to  Ephesus, 
which  became  the  center  of  the  secret  doctrines  of  Persia  and  India, 
and  these  culminated  in  the  worship  of  Diana,  giving  rise  to  the 
sects  of  the  Manichees  and  Gnostics,  and  finally  it  was  recovered  in 
its  perfect  form  by  the  Rosicrucians.  To  restore  that  Secret  Doct- 
rine is  the  aim  of  the  Theosophists,  of  whom  Madame  Blavatsky 
was  the  head,  and  are  now  represented  by  Mrs.  Besant. 

There  are  others  who,  like  Doctor  Maitland,  whilst  being  per- 
meated with  the  spirit  and  belief  in  Christianity,  and  all  that  ema- 
nated from  Christ,  are  striving  to  recover  what  went  before  and  led 
to  it,  and  who  perceive  Christianity  was  nothing  new,  except  in 
form  and  delivery,  but  that  something  anterior  existed,  enshrined 
in  the  teaching  of  secret  societies  like  the  Essenes  to  whom  Christ 
belonged.    My  belief  is  Bacon  was  profoundly  imbued  with  this 


INTBOBUCTION.  25 

knowledge,  and  sought  to  embalm  it  in  art,  for  delivery  to  after  ages 
by  what  he  terms  '  tlie  handing  on  of  the  Lamp  for  posterity^ ;  that  is, 
the  transmission  of  certain  secret  doctrines,  which  have  been  pre- 
served in  the  works  of  such  great  poets  as  Dante,  Virgil  and  even 
Homer.  In  Virgil's  sixth  book  of  the  ^neid  may  be  found  just  what 
I  postulate;  that  is,  the  history  of  initiation  into  the  Eleusinian 
mysteries  and  the  philosophy  taught  therein, —  all  of  which  is  a 
sort  of  ancient  Freemasonry.  The  great  poets  in  all  times  and 
ages,  have  been  the  guardians  and  transmitters  of  these  mysteries, 
and  the  wanderings  of  Ulysses  by  Homer,  belongs  to  the  same  cate- 
gory, being  a  history  of  the  soul,  combined  with  a  history  of  the 
race,  that  is  to  say,  in  the  adventures  of  Ulysses  we  have  presented 
to  us  parables  and  allegories  of  every  description,  some  relating  to 
the  temptations  of  the  flesh  and  the  transformations  or  disguises 
of  the  spirit,  as  in  the  incidents  of  Calypso  and  Circe,  others  again 
being  historical  and  dim  echoes  of  the  explorations  of  mankind  in 
a  vast  prehistoric  past,  when  probably  as  much  of  the  world  was 
known  and  open  to  navigation  as  it  is  now. 

It  has  been  the  fashion  to  talk  of  i)aganism,  as  synonymous  with 
everything  that  went  before  Christ,  and  to  include  the  Greeks  and 
Komans  in  the  category  of  heathens,  but  it  is  forgotten,  how  full  of 
most  excellent  morality,  is  much  of  the  best  classical  writing  of  the 
best  men,  like  Socrates,  Seneca  and  Cicero.  The  latter  was  initiated 
into  the  mysteries,  and  can  we  not  gather  from  the  following  pass- 
ages what  may  be  classed  with  the  highest  Christian  ethic  ? 

''  How  various  were  those  sufferings  of  Ulysses,  in  his  long  con- 
tinued wanderings,  when  he  became  the  slave  of  women  (if  you 
consider  Circe  and  Calypso  as  such):  and  in  all  he  said  he  sought 
to  be  complacent  and  agreeable  to  everybody,  nay,  put  up  with 
abuses  from  slaves  and  handmaidens  at  home,  that  he  might  at 
length  compass  what  he  desired ;  but  with  the  spirit  with  which  he 
is  represented,  Ajax  would  have  preferred  a  thousand  deaths  to 
suffering  such  indignities.''    {Cicero's  Offices,  ch.  xxxi.) 

Again : 

"  For  listen,  most  excellent  young  men,  to  the  ancient  speech  of 
Archytas  of  Tarentum,  a  man  eminently  great  and  illustrious, 
which  was  recorded  to  me  when  I,  a  young  man,  was  at 
Tarentum  with  Quintus  Maximus.  He  said  that  no  more  deadly 
plague  than  the  pleasure  of  the  body  was  inflicted  on  men  by 
nature ;  for  the  passions,  greedy  of  that  pleasure,  were  in  a  rash 
and  unbridled  manner  incited  to  possess  it;  that  hence  arose 
treasons  against  one's  country,  hence  the  ruining  of  states,  hence 
clandestine  conferences  with  enemies:   in  short,  that  there  was 


26  INTBODUGTION. 

no  crime,  no  wicked  act,  to  the  undertaking  of  which  the  lust  of 
pleasure  did  not  impel;  but  that  fornications  and  adulteries  and 
every  such  crime,  were  provoked  by  no  other  allurements  than 
those  of  pleasure.  And  whereas  either  nature  or  some  god  had  given 
to  man  nothing  more  excellent  than  his  mind;  that  to  this  divine 
function  and  gift,  nothing  was  so  hostile  as  pleasure  :  since  where 
lust  bore  sway,  there  was  no  room  for  self  restraint ;  and  in  the 
realm  of  pleasure,  virtue  could  by  no  possibility  exist.  And  that  this 
might  be  the  better  understood,  he  begged  you  to  imagine  in  your 
mind  nny  one  actuated  by  the  greatest  pleasure  of  the  body  that 
could  be  enjoyed ;  he  believed  no  one  would  doubt,  but  that  so  long 
as  the  person  was  in  that  state  of  delight,  he  would  be  able  to  con- 
sider nothing  in  his  mind,  to  attain  nothing  by  reason,  nothing  by 
reflection :  wherefore  that  there  was  nothing  so  detestable  and  so 
destructive  as  pleasure,  inasmuch  as  that  when  it  was  excessive  and 
very  prolonged,  it  extinguished  all  the  light  of  the  souV^ 

{On  Old  Age,  ch.  xii.) 

Lastly,  I  should  hke  to  observe,  the  study  of  Lord  Bacon's  works 
and  these  plays,  deserve  the  earnest  attention  and  application  of 
the  best  heads  upon  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  seeing  they  promise 
us  a  new  gospel,  or  rather  explanation  and  restoration  of  all  that 
has  been  preserved  from  the  shipwreck  of  ancient  mystery  sources  — 
whether  it  be  in  the  Bible,  in  the  Classics,  or  in  the  Kabbala.  If 
one  or  two  heads  only,  have  hitherto  already  discovered  a  few  things 
of  value,  how  much  more  of  greater  interest  may  be  gathered,  when 
there  is  some  sort  of  collaboration  and  systematized  labor  given  to 
the  problem !  This  mystery  is  entitled  to  the  same  sacrifice  of  time 
and  labor  we  give  to  the  study  of  a  science,  or  to  the  acquiring  of 
three  or  four  languages,  and  the  result  is  certainly  framed  on  a 
larger  scale  of  promise  than  any  science,  or  any  individual  self-cult- 
ure, seeing  in  my  humble,  though  profound  opinion,  the  solution 
touches  all  that  concerns  the  spiritual  and  future  welfare  of  man.  I 
am  convinced,  one  of  Bacon's  ends,  was  to  establish,  by  means  of 
examples  based  upon  art,  the  predominance  and  priority  of  the 
spiritual  in  nature,  acting  behind  phenomena,  or  the  curtain  of 
Nature's  Theatre — a  matter  which  can  truly  be  brought  home  to 
men's  minds,  by  interpretation  of  the  symbolism  of  his  types  or  pat- 
terns of  invention,  the  plays.  When  one  contemplates  the  cease- . 
less  industry  and  energy  of  men's  minds,  applied  to  solely  material 
progress  and  advancement,  one  cannot  refrain  from  thinking  of  the 
comparatively  neglected  field  of  intellectual  and  spiritual  industry 
or  progress.  The  former  is  visible,  the  latter  is  invisible,  but, 
nevertheless,  it  is  the  latter  which  concerns  man  as  much  and  even 


INTBODUCTION,  27 

more  than  the  former.  The  mind  performs  what  the  visible  or 
simply  material  never  can  effect;  that  is,  it  penetrates  walls  and 
doorS;  enters  the  heart  and  mind  of  man,  crosses  oceans,  bridges  time 
and  brings  about  revolutions,  which  neither  force  of  arms,  or  even 
money,  can  effect.  In  all  ages,  in  all  times,  humanity  is  overpowered 
by  the  predominance  of  the  purely  sensual,  and  what  comes  under 
local  and  particular  interests  only.  Nevertheless,  the  absolutely 
real  and  abiding  problems  of  life  are  those  which  revolve  upon  just 
those  questions  of  man's  destiny  hereafter,  for  guidance  upon  which 
we  have  to  turn  to  our  inspired  teachers,  the  poets,  the  philosophers, 
the  great  thinkers  of  all  ages,  and  this  is  all  the  revelation  we  can 
obtain  upon  these  mysteries.  When  we  think  of  Greece,  we  do  not, 
recall  to  mind  the  Parthenon,  or  the  Acropolis  of  Athens,  so  much 
as  we  do  Socrates  and  Plato,  ^schylus,  Euripides  and  Sophocles. 
Lord  Bacon  was  the  Plato  of  the  modern  world,  so  to  speak,  a  man 
charged  with  a  tremendous  message  to  mankind,  which  he  could  not 
deliver  in  his  own  age,  on  account  of  its  inability  to  receive  it.  He, 
therefore,  I  submit,  embodied  his  spiritual  teachings  in  art,  for  time 
to  discover,  for  the  spiritual  development  of  mind  to  unfold  as 
mankind  advances  and  overtakes  a  giant  peak  or  mountain,  hitherto 
out  of  sight  because  of  the  greatness  of  the  distance.  It  is  a  start- 
ling and  novel  theory  to  advance,  I  admit,  that  by  means  of  pure 
art,  one  single  man  has  addressed  himself  to  speak  to  another  gen- 
eration, by  means  of  a  cipher  hidden  in  his  written  works.  Never- 
theless, it  has  been  done,  as  many  are  beginning  to  realize,  and  the 
time  is  approaching  when  it  will  bo  established  as  a  scientific  fact, 
beyond  question  or  dispute.  The  first  thing  necessary  is  to  awaken 
sufBcient  interest  in  order  to  enlist  workers  and  students,  and  to 
obtain  a  respectful  hearing,  and  I  hope  the  efforts  being  made  in 
America  to  establish  a  periodical  devoted  to  the  subject,  will  meet 
with  the  success  it  undoubtedly  deserves.  A  writer  often  does  as 
much  good  by  drawing  attention  to  unsolved  and  obscure  questions, 
as  by  discovery.  Lord  Bacon's  works  are  full  of  enigmas  and 
mysteries,  so  also  is  his  life  and  correspondence,  as  has  lately 
been  ably  pointed  out  by  Mrs.  Pott.  And  this  is  in  the 
right  direction,  inviting  attention  and  inquiry  as  to  why  these  mys- 
teries exist,  and  to  what  they  point  to  ?  For  example,  why  did 
Bacon  term  himself  a  concealed  poet,  as  Aubrey  even  admits?  Why 
are  the  dedicatory  poems  attached  to  many  of  his  works  full  of 
mysterious  allusions  to  Hehcon,  Parnassus,  Apollo  and  the  Castahan 


28  INTRODUCTION, 

spring  ?  Why  did  Powell  compare  Bacon  to  Seneca,  the  tragedian, 
in  the  following  verses,  which  I  have  already  published  in  Francis 
Bacon  f  How  was  it  he  writes  of  Bacon's  worth  clouded  in  obscurity^ 
seeing  Bacon's  prose  and  philosophical  wTitings  received  their  full 
meed  of  recognition  and  praise  during  his  lifetime? 

"  0,  give  me  leave  to  pull  the  curtain  bye. 
That  clouds  thy  tvorth  in  such  obscurity  ; 
Good  Seneca,  stay  but  awhile  thy  bleeding, 
T'  accept  what  I  received  at  thy  reading. 
Here  I  present  it  in  a  solemn  strain  : 
And  thus  I  pluck  the  curtain  back  again. " 
(From  the  Attorneys^  Academy,  Thomas  Powell,  1630.) 

This  one  poem  proves.  Bacon  never  received  full  recognition  of 
his  worth,  and  the  comparison  to  the  dramatist  Seneca,  with  the 
imagery  of  the  curtain  of  a  theatre,  gives  us,  as  it  were,  a  peep  at  the 
concealed  actor  behind  the  curtain  of.  his  own  theatre,  revealed  for  a 
moment  by  one  who  knew  perfectly  well  what  he  was  writing  about. 
Bacon  observes  "  Affirmatives  have  more  force  with  men's  minds 
than  Negatives. "  That  is,  when  once  the  ears  have  been  captured 
by  auricular  traditions,  and  the  rights  of  possession,  it  is  almost 
impossible  to  undo  what  has,  so  to  speak,  been  burnt  in  the  mind. 
Shakespeare  is  just  such  an  affirmative.  Bacon's  claim  to  the  au- 
thorship of  the  plays  being  a  negation  of  Shakespeare's  prescriptive 
right,  unquestioned  for  nearly  three  hundred  years.  The  truth  is, 
Bacon  has  conspired  against  himself,  if  I  may  so  express  it;  a  theory 
abundantly  revealed  in  the  so-called  Shakespeare  sonnets.  In  the 
35th  sonnet  we  read  of  time : 

*^  That  I  an  accessary  needs  must  be 
To  that  sweet  thief  which  sourly  robs  from  me." 

In  Sonnet  48  can  be  perceived  evidence  the  poet  author  was 
striving  to  conceal  something,  and  taking  pains  to  hide  his  identity: 

"  How  careful  was  I,  when  I  took  my  way, 
Each  trifle  under  truest  bars  to  thrust. 
That  to  my  use  it  might  unused  stay 
From  hands  of  falsehood,  in  sure  wards  of  trust. " 

Why  was  this  necessary  ?  Because,  I  submit.  Bacon  lived  in  an 
age,  which  he  states,  was  crippled  by  authority. 

"  And  art  made  tongue-tied  by  authority 


And  simple  truth  miscalled  simphcity." 


INTRODUCTION.  29 

And  here  is  evidence  of  his  inability  to  claim  his  own  during  his 
lifetime : 

"'  Wander  a  word  for  shadows  like  myself 
That  take  the  pain,  but  cannot  pluck  the  pelf. " 

The  whole  of  these  sonnets  are  full  of  evidence  pointing  to  a 
creative  scheme,  of  extraordinary  character,  allied  to  some  termi- 
nal revelation,  connected  with  time  and  posterity.  Just  as  we  find 
Bacon  repeatedly  appealing  to  far-off  ages,  so  in  these  sonnets  there 
is  textual  evidence  of  a  spiritual  heir,  who  is  the  poet  himself,  per- 
sonified as  his  son  or  friend,  in  reality  his  wisdom  sacrificed  as  the 
Logos,  in  his  works. 

''  Then  what  could  death  do,  if  thou  shouldst  depart, 
Leaving  thee  living  in  posterity  f' 

In  Sonnet  124  is  evidence  of  some  secret  connected  with  time, 
which  is  to  be  revealed : 

^^  Her  audit  though  delayed,  answered  must  be. 
And  her  quietus  is  to  render  thee." 

The  sonnets  by  themselves,  carry  proof  of  what  I  have,  in  A  New 
Study  of  Shakespeare,  called  the  New  Life,  after  the  manner  of 
Dante's  Nuova  Vita.  The  poet  opens  his  theme  with  the  image 
of  marriage  for  the  sake  of  immortal  ofispring,  an  idea  entirely, 
I  submit,  borrowed  from  Plato's  Banquet,  that  is  a  perfect  art 
scheme,  wherein  the  marriage  of  truth  and  beauty,  or  of  wisdom 
through  art,  shall  imitate  nature,  and  give  back  to  the  poet  his  own 
immortality  through  rebirth. 

Such  a  theory  of  revelation  by  cipher,  as  Mr.  Donnelly  and 
myself  postulate,  could  only  have  emanated  from  the  mind  of  an 
extraordinary  man  assisted  by  others.  The  mystery  relating  to 
Shakespeare  bears  the  imprint  of  careful  calculation  and  plan.  No 
letters  exist  of  Shakespeare's  to  any  body  of  his  age,  yet  it  is  cer- 
tain, if  he  wrote  the  plays,  he  must  have  had  an  immense  corre- 
spondence with  his  contemporaries,  and  with  his  publishers.  Why 
did  he  suppress  them  "i  How  did  he  manage  to  destroy  every  ves- 
tige of  this  correspondence?  Surely  the  Earl  of  Southampton  and 
the  Earl  of  Pembroke,  Ben  Jonson  and  others,  would  have  preserved 
the  letters  of  a  Shakespeare,  and  that  somewhere  in  boxes  and 
trunks,  such  letters  should  have  been  found  ere  now?  As  Mr.  Don- 
nelly has  pointed  out,  neither  library  or  letters  or  manuscripts  exist 
belonging  to  Shakespeare,  and  all  this  is  proof  either  Shakespeare 


30  INTBOBUCTION. 

never  possessed  a  library  or  wrote  letters,  or  indeed,  wrote  anything, 
or  else  we  arrive  at  the  inevitable  conclusion,  Shakespeare  was  con- 
spiring against  himself,  taking  extraordinary  pains  to  destroy  every 
vestige  of  his  own  personal  history  and  life,  gathering  deliberately 
a  veil  of  mystery  around  his  individuality,  as  if  ashamed  that 
posterity  should  learn  anything  whatever  about  him, —  perfectly 
indifferent  to  his  own  writings, — destroying  the  manuscripts  of  the 
plays, —  burning  his  library  (The  Horn-book?), —  entreating  those 
he  had  corresponded  with  to  return  or  tear  up  his  letters, —  all  of 
which  is  contradicted  by  the  Sonnets  ascribed  to  him,  where  the 
consciousness  of  immortality  is  enforced  in  every  verse  and  line, 
associated,  however,  always  with  some  far-off  age,  some  revelation 
or  disclosure  !  All  this  proves  plan,  purport  or  design,  because  no 
person  who  reflects  for  a  moment,  can  believe  all  this  mystery  arose 
by  accident,  or  was  the  result  of  pure  carelessness !  Just  at  this 
same  period  Shakespeare  dies,  we  hear  in  literature  of  a  mysterious 
society  arising  on  the  horizon  of  Europe, — a  society  whose  princi- 
ples were  those  of  invisibility  and  sacrifice, — the  Kosicrucians.  Here 
was  a  secret  sect,  which  distinctly  cultivated  mystery  as  an  art,  and 
suppressed  themselves  very  much,  as  we  find  Shakespeare  seems  to 
have  done,  and  we  find  their  headquarters  in  England,  for  their  real 
champion  was  ostensibly  Eobert  Fludd,  who  was  publishing  his 
works  abroad  at  Gouda,  Oppenheim  and  Frankfort,  and  this  has 
partly  occasioned  the  belief,  the  Rosicrucian  Brotherhood  arose  on 
the  continent.  In  both  Bacon's  and  the  reputed  Shakespeare's  works 
there  is  a  great  deal  of  occult  or  Cabalistical  doctrine,  which  reflect 
each  other,  and  in  one  of  the  Rosicrucian  manifestoes,  evidently  writ- 
ten 1616,  or  the  year  of  Shakespeare's  death,  and  published  1617,  at 
Frankfort  (where  Fludd  was  publishing  also),  the  public  are  cautioned 
to  beware  of  a  Stage  Player,  ''  a  man  with  sufficient  ingenuity  for 
imposition."  This  I  have  called  attention  to  in  my  last  work,  Francis 
Baoon.  Shakespeare  figures  as  an  actor  in  the  list  of  players 
attached  to  the  1623  Folio  plays.  This  reference  to  a  stage-player  is 
upon  pages  52, 53  of  the  Confession  of  the  Hosier  ucian  Society  I  allude 
to.  The  objection,  it  was  printed  abroad  in  German,  is  met  by  the 
argument  of  the  danger  attending  its  publication  in  England.  In 
these  Rosicrucian  manifestoes  there  are  strong  parallels  pointing  to 
Bacon's  ends ;  his  inquiry  Into  nature,  his  plus  ultra  simile  and  his 
antagonism  to  Aristotle.  In  support  of  all  this  we  find  Burton,  in 
his  Anatomy  of  Melancholy,  in  1621,  stating  the  real  founder  of  the 


INTBODUCTION,  31 

society  of  the  Eosie  Cross  was  then  living,  and  he  describes  him 
as  the  Instaurator  of  all  arts  and  sciences  in  a  foot-note.  How  is 
it  Burton  and  Ben  Jonson,  both  Englishmen,  dwell  so  much  upon 
the  Rosicrucians  and  know  so  much  about  them  ?  How  is  it  Bacon's 
death  is  followed  by  a  string  of  writers,  all  English,  who  profess 
themselves  Rosicrucians,  and  one  of  whom  describes  the  Land  of 
the  Rosicrucians,  word  for  word,  in  the  same  text  as  Bacon's  New 
Atlantis  f  There  are  some  few  facts  pointing  or  suggesting  St. 
Albans  was  connected  with  some  secret  society  of  the  Rose.  In  St. 
Peter's  church,  St.  Albans,  is  a  grave-stone  with  a  brass  rose  upon 
it,  and  a  curious  epitaph.  Sir  John  Mandeville  (from  whom  I  have 
quoted  in  my  chapter  upon  the  Rosicrucians)  writes  upon  the 
occult  history  of  the  Rose.  He  was  a  native  of  Saint  Albans,  a 
great  traveler,  and  lies  buried  in  the  Abbey.  The  abbeys  were 
indeed  the  depositories  and  shrines  in  past  ages  of  much  mystic 
and  occult  lore,  and  in  the  works  of  Matthew,  of  Paris,  who  was  a 
monk  of  St.  Albans  Abbey,  I  find  a  great  deal  of  history  concern- 
ing the  Knights  Templar.  It  is  round  Melrose  Abbey  and  Rosslyn 
Chapel,  we  find  Sir  Walter  Scott  associating  these  Red  Cross 
Knights,  and  it  is  not  going  too  far  to  suggest  they  were  closely 
associated  with  all  the  great  churches  in  England  and  Scotland,  as 
with  the  Temple  Church  in  London,  which,  through  its  association 
with  the  law,  was  also  associated  with  Bacon's  life.  The  Eliza- 
bethan literature  was  strongly  tinctured  with  the  chivalry  of  these 
Crusaders,  as  may  be  perceived  in  Sidney's  Arcadia,  in  Spenser's 
Fairy  Queen,  and  in  such  plays  as  The  Two  Noble  Kinsmen. 
Going  further  back  in  literary  history,  we  find  it  influencing 
Chaucer,  and  Cower,  Meung  and  all  the  Italian  sonneteers  like 
Petrarch,  Boccaccio,  and  even  Dante.  This  literature  is  known  as 
the  Love  Philosophy,  and  is  partly  borrowed  from  platonic  doc- 
trines and  philosophy,  but  also  traces  back  its  origin  to  King 
Arthur  and  the  Knights  of  the  Round  Table.  At  Winchester  might 
be  seen,  a  few  years  ago,  the  supposed  round  table  in  the  court- 
house, with  a  rose  in  the  center  of  the  twelve  seiges  or  seats  of  the 
Knights  ranged  round  it.  There  is  distinct  evidence  in  the  Shake- 
speare Sonnets  (as  they  are  called)  of  this  Love  Philosophy  con- 
nected with  the  knightly  chivalry  of  the  Middle  Ages,  which  was, 
so  to  speak,  the  ideal  in  the  literature  of  romance,  uniting  religion 
and  philosophy,  love  and  adventure,  mysticism  and  occult  lore,  with 
the  ideal  figure  of  the  soldier  hero  fighting  for  religion : 


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THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEMTUEE. 


CHAPTER  I. 
The   Tempest. 


"  It  is  an  immense  ocean  that  surrounds  the  island  of  Truth." — Bacoi?'. 

Ben  Jonson's  masque  of  The  Fortunate  Isles  and  their  Union, 
designed  for  the  Court  on  the  Twelfth  Night,  1626,  contains  the  most 
complete  proofs  (possible  to  obtain  by  parallels)  pointing  to  the 
play  of  The  Tempest  on  the  one  hand,  and  to  Bacon's  New  Atlantis, 
as  the  Land  of  the  Rosicrucians,  on  the  other.  In  1626  Bacon  died. 
In  16261  was  first  published  the  fable  of  the  New  Atlantis.  John 
Heydon's  Land  of  the  Bosicrucians  (which  is  word  for  word  identical 
with  Bacon's  New  Atlantis)  was  not  published  till  many  years  later, 
so  that  the  reader  will  perceive  from  the  complete  parallels  I  am 
about  to  adduce,  Ben  Jonson  could  not  have  copied  from  Heydon, 
and  must  have  been  acquainted  with  Bacon's  Atlantis.  The  entire 
masque  is  a  satire  upon  the  pretensions  of  the  Rosicrucians  and 
upon  their  extravagant  promises  and  Utopian  schemes  of  scientific 
attainment  as  prefigured  in  Bacon's  New  Atlantis.  But  first,  as  to 
the  relationship  of  this  masque  to  the  play  of  The  Tempest. 

The  title  itself.  The  Fortunate  Isles,  recalls  at  once,  by  parallel, 
Prospero's  magic  isle,  which  had  been  published,  for  the  first  time, 
three  years  back  in  the  collected  edition  of  the  1623  folio. 

The  opening  of  the  masque  at  once  introduces  us  to  an  ironical 
portrait  of  Ariel,  who,  in  The  Tempest,  is  described  as  an  airy  spirit. 

I  think  no  student  of  The  Tempest  will  question  the  fact  that 
Prospero,  by  his  introduction  of  the  vision  or  masque  of  Juno,  Ceres 

1  Spedding  states  1627  to  be  the  date  of  the  first  edition  of  The  Atlantis  and 
Sylva,  but  he  is  wrong.    I  possess  a  copy  bearing  date  1626. 
3  33      „ 


34  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

and  Iris,  coupled  with  the  text,  is  intended  to  prefigure  some  sort  of 
Jupiter.     There  is  one  passage  which  almost  proves  this : 

Pros.  Ye  elves  of  hills,  brooks,  standing  lakes  and  groves, 
And  ye  that  on  the  sands  with  printless  foot 
Do  chase  the  ebbing  Neptune  and  do  fly  him 
When  he  comes  back ;  you  demi-puppets  that 
By  moonshine  do  the  green  sour  ringlets  make, 
Whereof  the  ewe  not  bites,  and  you  whose  pastime 
Is  to  make  midnight  mushrooms,  that  rejoice 
To  hear  the  solemn  curfew;  by  whose  aid, 
Weak  masters  though  ye  be,  I  have  bedimm'd 
The  noontide  sun,  call'd  forth  the  mutinous  winds, 
And  'twixt  the  green  sea  and  the  azured  vault 
Set  roaring  war:  to  the  dread  ratthng  thunder 
Have  I  given  fire  and  rifted  Jove^s  stout  oak 
With  his  own  bolt. 

In  the  last  play  of  the  folio,  as  well  as  in  this,  the  first,  we  find  the 
classical  element  strong.  In  Cymbeline  Jupiter  is  introduced  as 
some  deus  ex  machina,  connected  with  oracular  dreams  and  divina- 
tion. It  must  be  plain  to  the  classical  student  the  last  eflbrts  in  art 
of  the  poet  were  based  upon  a  profound  classical  undercurrent  of 
idea  connected  with  the  protagonists  of  the  Mysteries, — Ceres,  Pros- 
erpine, Jupiter.  Now  Ben  Jonson's  masque  opens  with  the  entry  of 
one  Johphiel,  described  as  follows : 

Entreth  in,  running,  Johphiel,  an  aeri/ spirit,  and  (according  to  the 
Magi)  the  Intelligence  of  Jupitefs  sphere :  attired  in  light  silks  of 
several  colors,  with  wings  of  the  same,  bright  yellow  hair,  a  chaplet 
of  flowers,  blue  silk  stockings  and  pumps,  and  gloves,  with  a  silver 
fan  in  his  hand. 

Johphiel.    Like  a  lightning  from  the  sky, 
Or  an  arrow  shot  by  Love, 
Or  a  bird  of  his  let  fly. 
Bee't  a  sparrow  or  a  dove : 
With  that  winged  haste,  come  I, 
Loosed  from  the  sphere  of  Jove 
To  wish  good-night 
To  your  delight.i 

lln  the  Dramatis  Pcrsonse  of  The  Tempest  Ariel' is  described  as  an  airy  spirit 
just  as  Johphiel  is  represented,  and  we  may  refind  in  the  following  text  the  original 
of  the  lines  cited  above  : 

Unter  Aeiel. 
Ariel.    All  hail,  great  master !  grave  sir,  hail !  I  come 
To  answer  thy  best  pleasure ;  be't  to  fly, 
To  swim,  to  dive  into  the  fire,  to  ride 
On  the  curl'd  clouds,  to  thy  strong  bidding  task 
Ariel  and  all  his  quality. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  35 

To  Jiim  enters,  a  melancholic  student,  in  hare  and  worn  clotheSj 
shrouded  under  an  obscure  cloak  and  the  eaves  of  an  old  hat,  fetching 
a  deep  sigh,  Mr.  Mere-Foole. 

Mere-Foole.    Oh!    Oh! 

Johphiel.    In  Saturn's  name,  the  Father  of  my  Lord  1 
What  over-charged  piece  of  melancholy 
Is  this  breaks  in  between  my  wishes  thus 
With  bombing  sighs'? 

Mere-Foole.    No!    No  intelligence ! 
Not  yet,  and  all  my  vows  now  nine  days  old. 
Bhndness  of  fate !    Puppies  had  seen  hy  this  time  I 
But  I  see  nothing !  that  I  should !  or  would  see ! 
What  mean  the  brethren  of  the  Bosie  Cross 
So  to  desert  their  votary  ? 

Johphiel.    0  !  t'is  one 
Hath  bow'd  himself  unto  that  airy  order, 
And  now  is  gaping  for  the  Hy  they  promised  him ; 
I'll  mix  a  little  with  him  for  my  sport. 

In  the  following  passage  may  be  perceived  mimistakable  allusion 
to  the  marvels  prefigured  {prodromi  or  anticipations  being  the 
fifth  division  of  the  Instauration)  in  Bacon's  New  Atlantis,  as  the 
secrets  of  the  College  of  the  Six  Days : 

Johphiel.    When  you  have  made 
Your  glasses,  gardens  in  the  depth  of  winter, 
Where  you  will  walk  invisible  to  mankind, 
Talked  with  all  birds  and  beasts  in  their  own  language; 
When  you  have  penetrated  hills  like  air, 
Dived  to  the  bottom  of  the  sea  like  lead. 
And  risen  again  like  cork,  walked  in  the  fire 
An  'twere  a  Salamander,  passed  through  all 
The  winding  orbs  like  an  Intelligence, 
Up  to  the  Empyreum  j  when  you  have  made 
The  world  your  gallery,  can  dispatch  a  business 
In  some  three  minutes  with  the  Antipodes, 
And,  in  five  more,  negotiate  the  globe  over. 

All  these  things  are  ironical  descriptions  of  the  pretensions  of 
the  Rosicrucians,  and  are  described  in  the  New  Atlantis: 

"  We  have  also  glasses  and  means  to  see  minute  and  small  bod- 
ies perfectly  and  distinctly,  as  the  shapes  and  colors  of  small  flies 
and  worms,  grains  and  flaws  in  gems,  which  cannot  otherwise  be 
seen.  We  make  artificial  rainbows,  halos  and  circles  about  light. 
We  represent  also  all  manner  of  reflections,  refractions  and  multi- 
plication of  visual  beams  of  objects. " 

*'  We  have  also  large  and  various  orchards  and  gardens.  And  we 
make,  by  art,  in  the  same  orchards  and  gardens,  trees  and  flowers  to 
come  earlier  or  later  than  their  seasons,  and  to  come  up  and  bear 
more  speedily  than  by  their  natural  course  they  do.  '^ 


36  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEEATURE. 

"  We  represent  and  imitate  all  artificial  sounds  and  letters,  and 
the  voices  and  notes  of  beasts  and  birds. '^ 

"  We  have  large  and  deep  caves  of  several  depths.  The  deepest 
are  sunk  six  hundred  fathoms,  and  some  of  them  are  digged  and 
made  under  great  hills  and  mountains;  so  that  if  you  reckon  to- 
gether the  depth  of  the  hill  and  the  depth  of  the  cave,  they  are 
(some  of  them)  above  three  miles  deep." 

"  We  have  also  means  to  convey  sounds  in  trunks  and  pipes  in 
strange  lines  and  distances. " 

In  Ben  Jonson's  News  from  the  New  World  Discovered  in  the 
Moon,  published  1620  (presented  at  court  before  King  James  I.),  I 
find  a  great  many  satirical  allusions  to  the  Kosicrucians.  Indeed, 
the  masque  reads  as  if  it  were  a  hit  at  their  pretensions,  and  pos- 
sibly at  Bacon's  New  World  of  Sciences,  by  which  he  designates 
many  of  the  marvels  promised  in  the  future  by  means  of  his  induct- 
ive method  of  scientific  research : 

First  Herald.  The  brethren  of  the  Bosie  Cross  have  their  col- 
leges within  a  mile  o'  the  moon;  a  castle  in  the  air  that  stands  upon 
wheels  with  a  wing'd  lanthorn. 

Printer.    I  have  seen  it  in  print. 

Second  Herald.  All  the  fantastical  creatures  you  can  think  of 
are  there. 

Factor.    Are  there  no  self-lovers  there  ? 

Second  Herald.  There  were,  but  they  are  all  dead  of  late  for 
want  of  tailors. 

Factor.  V  light,  what  luck  is  that?  We  could  have  spared 
them  a  colony  from  hence. 

Second  Herald.  I  think  some  two  or  three  of  them  live  yet,  but 
they  are  turned  moon-calves  by  this. 

Printer.  0,  I,  moon-calves!  What  monster  is  that,  I  pray 
you? 

Second  Herald.  Monster  ?  None  at  all.  A  very  familiar  thing, 
like  our  fool  here  on  earth. 

Factor.  And  they  have  their  new  wells,  too,  and  physical  waters 
I  hope  to  visit  all  time  of  year? 

First  Herald.  Your  Tunbridge,  or  the  Spa  itself,  are  mere  pud- 
dles to  them.  When  the  pleasant  months  of  the  year  come,  they  all 
flock  to  certain  broken  islands,  which  are  called  there  the  Isles  of 
Delight. 

Factor.    By  clouds  still? 

First  Herald.    What  else  ?    Their  boats  are  clouds,  too. 

Second  Herald.  Or  in  the  mist ;  the  mists  are  ordinary  i'  the 
moon.  A  man  that  owes  money  there  needs  no  other  protection; 
only  buy  a  mist  and  walk  in't ;  he's  never  discerned;  a  matter  of  a 
baubee  does  it. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEM ATUBE.  37 

It  may  be  observed  we  have  in  this  passage  proof  that  these 
Isles  of  Delight  were  associated  with  the  Bosicrucians,  and  therefore 
Ben  Jonson's  title  of  The  Fortunate  Isles,  in  connection  with  the 
Kosicrucian  subject  of  the  piece,  explains  itself.  The  connection  of 
the  moon  with  all  this  is  not  purely  fanciful  (borrowed,  as  it  cer- 
tainly is,  from  a  piece  by  Lucian  of  Samosata),  and  finds  some 
strange  parallels  in  the  play  of  The  Tempest  (a  Fortunate  Isle),  as 
follows : 

Gonsalo.  You  are  gentlemen  of  brave  mettle;  you  would  lift 
tJie  moon  out  of  her  sphere,  if  she  would  continue  in  it  five  weeks 
without  changing. 

Sebastian.    We  would  so,  and  then  go  a  bat-fowling. — (Act  ii.,  1.) 

It  is  also  well  worthy  note  to  find  Caliban  termed  a  moon-calf 
and  monster.  1 

Stephano.    How  now,  moon-calf!  how  does  thine  ague  ? 

Caliban.    Hast  thou  not  dropped  from  heaven  1 

Stephano.  Out  of  the  moon,  I  do  assure  thee :  I  was  the  man  i' 
the  moon  when  time  was. 

Caliban.  I  have  seen  thee  in  her  and  I  do  adore  thee :  My  mis- 
tress showed  me  thee  and  thy  dog  and  thy  bush. 

Stephano.  Come,  swear  to  that ;  kiss  the  book.  I  will  furnish 
it  anon  with  new  contents.    Swear. 

Trinculo.  Bv  this  good  light,  this  is  a  very  shallow  monster !  I 
af eared  of  him?  A  very  weak  monster!  The  man  i'  the  moon! 
A  most  poor,  credulous  monster!  Well  drawn,  monster  in  good 
sooth ! 

In  the  same  masque,  by  Ben  Jonson,  News  from  the  New 
World  in  the  Moon,  I  find  the  following  passage : 

Factor.    But  to  your  news,  gentlemen,  whence  come  they  ? 

First  Herald.    From  the  moon,  ours,  sir. 

Factor.    From  the  moon !    Which  way  ?  by  sea  ?  or  by  land  ? 

First  Herald.    By  moonshine,  a  nearer  way,  I  take  it. 

Printer.  Oh  !  By  a  trunk  I  know  it,  a  thing  no  bigger  than  a 
flute  case ;  a  neighbor  of  mine,  a  spectacle-maker,  has  drawn  the 
moon  through  it  at  the  base  of  a  whistle,  and  made  it  as  great  as  a 
drumhead  twenty  times,  and  brought  it  within  the  length  of  this 
room  to  me,  I  know  not  how  often. 

Chronicler.  Tut,  that's  no  news;  your  perplexive  glasses  are 
common.  No;  it  will  fall  out  to  be  Pythagoras'  way,  I  warrant 
you,  by  writing  and  reading  i'  th'  moon. 

lit  has  been  pointed  out  (in  Halli well's  Notes  to  Outlines  of  the  Life  of 
Shahespeare,  p.  294)  that  Ben  Jonson,  in  the  following  extract  from  the  induction 
to  Bartholomeio  Fair,  alludes  to  the  play  of  The  Tempest  and  The  Winter's  Tale : 
"  If  there  he  never  a  servant-monster  i'  the  Fair,  who  can  help  it,"  he  says:  "nor  a 
nest  of  antiques?  He  is  loath  to  make  Nature  afraid  in  his  plays,  like  those  that 
beget  Tales,  Tempests,  and  such  like  drolleries.''^  Phillips,  in  combating  the  theory 
of  allusion  to  The  Tempest  in  this  passage,  OYerlooks  another  satirical  parallel  in 
the  play  itself— moon-calf. 


38  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE, 

Printer.  Right,  and  as  well  read  of  you.  I'  faith;  for  Cornelius 
Agrippa  has  it  In  Disco  Lunce,  there  'tis  found. 

First  Herald.  Sir,  you  are  lost,  I  assure  you ;  for  ours  came  to 
you  neither  by  the  way  of  Cornelius  Agrippa,  nor  Cornelius  Dribble. 

Second  Herald.    Nor  any  glass  of 

First  Herald.    No  philosopher's  fantasy. 

Second  Herald.    Mathematicians  Perspicil 

First  Herald.  Or  brother  ot  the  Bosie- Crosses  intelhgence,  no 
forced  way,  but  by  the  neat  and  clean  power  of  poetry. 

Second  Herald.    The  mistress  of  all  discovery. 

First  Herald.  Who,  after  a  world  of  these  curious  uncertain- 
ties, hath  employed  thither  a  servant  of  hers  in  search  of  truth 
—  who  has  been  there. 

Second  Herald.    In  the  moon  ? 

First  Herald.    In  person. 

Second  Herald.    And  is  this  wight  returned  ? 

Factor.  Where  f  Which  is  he  f  I  must  see  his  dog  at  his 
girdle,  and  the  bush  of  thorns  at  his  back,  ere  I  believe  it. 

First  Herald.  Do  not  trouble  your  faith,  then,  for  if  that  bush  of 
thorns  should  prove  a  goodly  grove  of  oaks,  in  what  case  were  you 
and  your  expectation  ? 

I  am  not  the  only  writer  who,  besides  D'Israeli,  has  perceived 
(Curiosities  of  Literature),  the  Eosicrucian  character  of  the  magic 
Prospero  deals  in.  I  quote  the  following  from  a  modern  journal 
entitled  The  Bosicrucian,^  which  professes  to  elaborate  the  ancient 
doctrines  of  the  Society : 

"  The  beautiful  play  of  The  Tempest  was  written  five  or  six  years 
after  the  outburst  of  the  Rosicrucian  controversy  in  Germany;  and 
Shakespeare  seems  to  have  had  a  vivid  impression  of  the  elemental 
sprites  in  his  mind  when  he  drew  the  sweet  portraiture  of  Ariel, 
though  the  name  of  Sylph  is  never  once  mentioned  by  the  great 
bard.  She  is  not,  however,  exactly  the  Sylph  of  the  Rosi- 
crucians,  but  partly  a  nymph,  and  partly  a  fairy.  Silvester 
Jourdan's  account  of  the  discovery  of  the  Bermudas,  which  is 
supposed  to  have  furnished  Shakespeare  with  some  hints  for  this 
play,  describes  only  a  sort  of  monster,  whom  Shakespeare  rarefied 
into  Caliban,  but  no  Ariel.  Stowe,  who  mentions  in  his  annals  the 
shipwreck  of  Sir  George  Somers  upon  this  isle,  speaks  of  it  as  being 
inhabited  only  with  'witches  and  devils,  which  grew  by  reason 
of  accustomed  monstrous  thunderstorms  and  tempests ! '  But,  as  we 
have  before  remarked,  the  Rosicrucians  had  begun  to  erect  a  brighter 
superstition  than  the  old  and  hideous  one  of  devils  and  witches;  and 
Shakespeare,  from  slight  hints  heard  perhaps  in  conversation,  and 

1  The  Bosicrucian  and  Masonic  Becord,  "Vol.  I.  Gossip  about  the  Kosicrucians, 
p.  46. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  39 


not  derived  from  books,  caught  the  first  idea  of  his  ^delicate  Ariel;' 
who,  at  the  command  of  the  philosopher  Prospero  — 

'  could  fly 

Or  swim,  or  dive  into  the  fire,  or  ride 
On  the  curled  clouds ; ' 

and  who,  bound  by  the  potent  spell  of  the  magician  —  and  not  only 
by  that,  but  by  his  love  and  kindness  —  did  him  in  all  things  worthy 
service  — 


and  who 


^  Told  him  no  lies,  made  no  mistakings,  served 
Without  or  grudge  or  grumblings; ' 


'  trod  the  ooze  of  the  salt  deep, 

And  ran  upon  the  sharp  wind  of  the  north, 
And  did  his  business  in  the  veins  o'  the  earth 
When  it  was  baked  with  frost; ' 

who  played  delicious  music  iu  Ferdinand's  ear,  and  'allayed  the 
wind's  fury  and  his  passion  with  its  sweet  air' — who  made  music  to 
the  'varlets,'  and  beat  her  aerial  tabor  with  her  dainty  fingers  — 

'  At  which,  like  unbacked  colts,  they  pricked  their  ears, 
That,  calf-like,  they  her  lowing  followed  through 
Toothed  briers,  sharp  furzes,  pricking  gorse  and  thorns 
Which  entered  their  frail  skins ;  and  at  last  left  them 
r  the  filthy  mantled  pool  beyond  the  cell; ' 

and  who,  when  not  employed  in  Executing  the  behests  of  her  sover- 
eign master,  sang  to  herself,  describing  her  mode  of  life  — 

'  Where  the  bee  sucks,  there  suck  I : 
In  a  cowslip's  bell  I  lie ; 
There  I  couch  when  owls  do  cry : 
On  the  bat's  back  I  do  fly 
After  summer  merrily — 
Merrily,  merrily.'  "  " 

In  the  same  masque  of  The  Fortunate  Isles  and  Their  Union, 
the  following  verses  are  addressed  to  the  King,  which  convinces  me 
Ben  Jonson  knew  more  of  the  Eosicrucians  than  may  appear  from 
his  external  text.    For  example  : 

"  When  all  the  fortunate  islands  should  be  joined, 
Macaria,  one,  and  thought  a  principal, 
That  hitherto  hath  floated  as  uncertain 
Where  she  should  fix  her  blessings,  is  to-night 
Instructed  to  adhere  to  your  Britannia. 
That  where  the  happy  spirits  live,  hereafter 
Might  be  no  question  made  hy  the  most  curious, 
Since  the  Macarii  come  to  do  you  homage. 

"  Here  the  scene  opens,  and  the  masquers  are  discovered  sitting  in 
their  several  sieges.    Tlie  air  opens  above,  and  Apollo  with  Har- 


40  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEEATUBE. 

MONY  and  the  spirits  of  music  sing  the  while  the  island  moves  for- 
ward— Proteus  sitting  below  and  Jiearkening. 

SONG. 

"  Look  forth  the  shepheard  of  the  seas 
And  of  the  ports  that  keep  the  keys, 

And  to  your  Neptune  tell, 
Macaria,  prince  of  all  the  isles, 
Doth  here  put  in  to  dwell. 
The  winds  are  sweet  and  gently  blow, 
But  Zephirus,  no  breath  they  know, 

The  father  of  the  flowers; 
By  him  the  virgin  violets  live, 
And  every  plant  doth  odors  give, 

As  new  as  are  the  bowers. " 

In  the  following  description  of  this  isle  we  may  perceive  an 
echo  of  Gonzalo's  Utopia  in  The  Tempest : 

"  There  is  no  sickness,  nor  no  old  age  known 
To  man,  nor  any  grief  that  he  dares  own. 
There  is  no  hunger  there,  nor  envy  of  state. 
Nor  least  ambition  in  the  magistrate. 
But  all  are  even-hearted,  open,  free, 
And  what  one  is,  another  strives  to  be. " 

This  is  all  in  context  with  the  Rosicrucians,  and  no  question  this 
is  a  portrait  of  their  Fortunate  Island,  Macaria.  The  latter  may 
seem  a  fanciful  name,  picked  up  at  random,  but  it  is  not  so. 
Macaria  was  one  of  the  ancient  names  of  Rhodes,  viz.:  Macaria,  or 
the  Blessed,  which  name  has  been  derived  from  one  of  the  four 
sons  of  Macar,  who  colonized  Lesbos.  The  three  other  brothers, 
respectively,  seized  Chios,  Samos  and  Co,  so  that  these  four  islands 
obtained  the  name  of  Macares.  Now  it  is  well  known  the  Rosicrucians 
derived  their  origin  and  history  from  the  island  of  Rhodes.  It  was 
there  the  Knights  Hospitallers  of  St.  John  fixed  their  abode,  their 
order  having  arisen  out  of  the  piety  of  certain  traders  of  Amalfi,  in 
the  Kingdom  of  Naples.  The  map  of  the  world  prepared  by 
Andreas  Bianco,  in  the  fifteenth  century,  represents  Eden,  Adam 
and  Eve,  and  the  tree  of  life.  On  the  left,  on  a  peninsula,  are  seen 
the  reprobated  people  of  Gog  and  Magog,  who  are  to  accompany 
Antichrist.  Alexander  is  also  represented  there.  The  paradisaical 
peninsula  has  a  building  on  it  with  the  inscription  Ospitius  Macarii. 
This  legend  has  reference  to  the  pilgrims  of  St.  Macarius,  a  tradi- 
tion that  was  spread  on  the  return  of  the  Crusaders  of  three  monks, 
who  undertook  a  voyage  to  discover  the  point  where  earth  and 
heaven  meet,  that  is  to  say,  the  terrestrial  paradise. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  41 

I  have  now  an  important  piece  of  evidence  to  adduce,  which  I 
think  will  go  far  to  connect  Bacon's  New  Atlantis  with  Prospero's 
magic  isle  in  the  play  of  Tlie  Tempest. 

There  is  clear  evidence  of  the  attention  with  which  Shakespeare 
read  Florio's  Montaigne : 

"  When  Shakespeare,  in  The  Tempest,  represents  the  kind  old  Gon- 
zalo  as  inventing  talk  to  divert  the  King's  mind  from  the  grief  on 
which  it  broods,  he  imagines  what  he  would  do  if  he  had  the  shap 
ing  of  a  commonwealth  to  his  own  fancy  and  says : 

^  r  the  commonwealth,  I  would  by  contraries 
Execute  all  things;  for  no  kind  of  traffic 
Would  I  admit:  no  name  of  magistrate; 
Letters  should  not  be  known;  no  use  of  service, 
Of  riches,  or  of  poverty;  no  contracts, 
Successions;  bound  of  land,  tilth,  vineyard,  none; 
No  use  of  metal,  corn,  or  wine,  or  oil; 
No  occupation;  all  men  idle,  all; 
And  women  too ;  but  innocent  and  pure : 
No  sovereignty.' 

It  has  frequently  been  pointed  out  by  editors  of  Shakespeare  that  this 
passage  is  a  paraphrase  from  the  thirtieth  essay  of  Montaigne's  First 
Book,  as  translated  by  Florio: — 'A  nation  .  .  .  that  hath  no 
kind  of  traffic,  no  knowledge  of  letters,  no  intelligence  of  num- 
bers, no  name  of  magistrate,  nor  of  politic  superiority;  no  use  of 
service,  of  riches,  or  of  poverty;  no  contracts,  no  successions,  no 
partitions,  no  occupation,  but  idle;  no  respect  of  kindred,  but  com- 
mon; no  apparel,  but  natural;  no  manuring  of  lands;  no  use  of 
wine,  corn,  or  metal.  The  very  words  that  import  lying,  falsehood, 
treason,  dissimulation,  covetousness,  envy,  detraction,  and  pardon, 
were  never  heard  of  amongst  them.'" 

No  critic,  however,  has  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  all  this 
cited  out  of  Montaigne's  thirtieth  essay  is  in  close  context  with  a 
description  of  Atlantis,  or  tJie  Great  Island  described  by  Plato.  The 
title  of  Montaigne's  thirtieth  essay  is  Of  the  Cannibals: 

"  Plato  maketh  Solon  to  report  that  he  had  learnt  of  the  Priests 
of  the  Citie  of  Sais  in  ^gypt,  that  whilom,  and  before  the  generall 
Deluge,  there  was  a  great  Hand  called  Atlantis,  situated  at  the 
mouth  of  the  strait  of  Gibraltar,  which  contained  more  flrme  land 
than  Affrike  and  Asia  together.  And  that  the  kings  of  that  countrie 
did  not  only  possesse  that  Hand,  but  had  so  farre  entred  into  the 
maine  land,  that  of  the  bredth  of  Aflfrike,  they  held  as  farre  as 
^gypt;  and  of  Europes  length,  as  farre  as  Tuscanie :  and  that  they 
undertooke  to  invade  Asia,  and  to  subdue  all  the  nations  that  com- 
passe  the  Mediterranean  Sea,  to  the  gulfe  of  Mare-Maggiore  [the 
Black  Sea],  and  to  that  end  they  traversed  all  Spaine,  France  and 
Italic,  so  farre  as  Greece,  where  the  Athenians  made  head  against 
them;  but  that  a  while  after,  both  the  Athenians  themselves,  and 


42  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

that  great  Hand,  were  swallowed  up  by  the  Deluge.  It  is  verie 
likely  this  extreme  ruiue  of  waters  wrought  strange  alterations  in 
the  habitations  of  the  earth :  as  some  hold  that  the  Sea  hath  divided 
Sicilie  from  Italie. 

"  The  other  testimouie  of  antiquitie,  to  which  some  will  referre  this 
discoverie,  is  in  Aristotle  (if  at  least  that  little  booke  of  unheard  of 
wonders  be  his),  wbere  he  reporteth  that  certaine  Carthaginians 
having  sailed  athwart  the  Atlantike  Sea,  without  the  strait  of  Gibral- 
tar, after  long  time,  they  at  last  discovered  a  great  fertill  hand,  all 
replenished  with  goodly  woods,  and  watred  with  great  and  deepe 
rivers,  farre  distant  from  al  land,  and  that  both  they  and  others, 
allured  by  the  goodnes  and  fertility  of  the  soile,  went  thither  with 
tbeir  wives,  children,  and  household,  and  there  began  to  inhabit  and 
settle  themselves.  The  Lords  of  Carthage  seeing  their  countrie  by 
little  and  little  to  be  dispeopled,  made  a  law  and  expresse  inhibition, 
that  upon  paine  of  death  no  more  men  should  goe  thither,  and  ban- 
ished all  that  were  gone  thither  to  dwell,  fearing  (as  they  said)  that 
in  successe  of  time,  they  would  so  multiply  as  they  might  one  day 
supplant  them,  and  overthrow  their  owne  estate.  This  narration  of 
Aristotle  hath  no  reference  unto  our  new  found  countries. '' 

Montaigne,  after  this  discusses  Plato's  Ideal  Eepublic  or  Utopia, 
in  the  words  already  quoted,  and  which  are  plagiarized  in  The  Temp- 
est. I  think  there  is  decided  proof  in  the  play  the  poet's  magic 
island,  where  he  locates  Prospero,  was  suggested  by  the  paragraph 
cited  from  Montaigne,  giving  Aristotle's  testimony  as  to  the  exist- 
ence of  Atlantis.  I  have  placed  in  italics  the  words  showing  how 
the  Carthaginians  discovered  a  great  fertile  island,  and  I  think  no 
unprejudiced  critic  will  deny  that  by  the  introduction  in  the  play  of 
Claribel  and  Tunis  (which  latter  was  the  site  of  ancient  Carthage) 
there  is  proof  the  poet  borrowed  from  Montaigne.  This  is  shown  by 
the  description  of  the  island  as  fertile,  twice  used  in  Montaigne's 
essay.    Compare : 

Caliban.  I'll  show  thee  eveTy  fertile  inch  o'  the  island.  (Act  ii., 
2,  152.) 

Caliban.    And  show'd  thee  all  the  qualities  o'  the  isle, 
The  fresh  springs,  brine  pits,  barren  place  and  fertile. 
(Acti.,2,  338.) 

The  name  of  Caliban  seems  but  an  easy  anagram  upon  Cannibal, 
which  is  the  title  of  Montaigne's  essay.  In  the  following  passage, 
we  have  evidence  the  shipwrecked  king  and  his  followers  come 
from  Tunis  or  Carthage  : 

Gonzalo.  Methinks  our  garments  are  now  as  fresh  as  when  we 
put  them  on  first  in  Afric,  at  the  marriage  of  the  king's  fair  daugh- 
ter Claribel  to  the  king  of  Tunis. 

Sebastian.  'Twas  a  sweet  marriage;  and  we  prosper  well  in  our 
return. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  43 

Adrian.  Tunis  was  never  graced  before  with  such  a  paragon  to 
their  queen. 

Gonzalo.    Not  since  widow  Dido's  time. 

Antonio.  Widow!  A  pox  o'that!  How  came  that  widow  in? 
widow  Dido! 

Sebastian.    What  if  he  had  said  "  widower ^neas  ''too?    Good  * 
Lord,  how  you  take  it! 

Adrian.  "Widow  Dido,"  said  you?  You  make  me  study  of 
that :  she  was  of  Carthage,  not  of  Tunis. 

Gonzalo.     this  Tunis,  sir,  was  Carthage. 

Adrian.     Carthage  f 

Gonzalo.    I  assure  you,  Carthage.     (Act  ii.,  scene  1 ) 

I  think  it  is  pretty  clear  the  poet's  magic  island  is  connected  with 
the  Great  Atlantis,  described  by  Aristotle  and  by  Montaigne,  which 
the  Carthaginians  discovered.  These  shipwrecked  characters  are 
pictured  returning  from  Carthage.  Directly  we  turn  to  Bacon's 
description  of  his  island'  of  the  New  Atlantis  (which  was  published 
three  years  after  the  first  appearance  of  The  Tempest  in  the  first 
Folio,  1623),  we  find  this: 

''  You  shall  understand,  that  which  perhaps  you  will  scarce  think 
credible,  that  about  three  thousand  years  ago,  or  somewhat  more,  the 
navigation  of  the  world,  especially  for  remote  voyages,  was  greater 
than  at  this  day.  Do  not  think  with  yourselves  that  1  know  not 
how  much  it  is  increased  with  you  within  these  sixscore  years;  I 
know  it  well ;  and  yet  I  say,  greater  then  than  now.  Whether  it 
was  that  the  example  of  the  ark  that  saved  the  remnant  of  men 
from  the  universal  deluge,  gave  men  confidence  to  adventure  upon 
the  waters,  or  what  it  was,  but  such  is  the  truth.  The  Phoenicians, 
and  especially  the  Tyrians,  had  great  fleets  ;  so  had  the  Carthaginians 
their  colony,  ivhich  is  yet  further  tvest.  Toward  the  east  the  shipping 
of  Egypt  and  of  Palestina  was  likewise  great;  China  also,  and  the 
great  Atlantis,  that  you  call  America,  which  have  now  but  junks 
and  canoes,  abounded  then  in  tall  ships.  This  island,  as  appeareth 
by  fafthful  registers  of  those  times,  had  then  fifteen  hundred  strong 
ships  of  great  content.  Of  all  this  there  is  with  you  sparing  mem- 
ory, or  none;  but  we  have  large  knowledge  thereof. 

^^  At  that  time  this  land  ivas  knoivn  and  frequented  hy  the  ships 
and  vessels  of  all  the  nations  before  named,  and,  as  it  cometh  to  pass, 
they  had  many  times  men  of  other  countries  that  were  no  sailors 
that  came  with  them;  as  Persians,  Chaldeans,  Arabians;  so  as 
almost  all  nations  of  might  and  fame  resorted  hither,  of  whom  we 
have  some  stirps  and  little  tribes  with  us  at  this  day." 

Thus  it  appears  both  the  author  of  the  plays  and  Lord  Bacon 
at  about  the  same  time,  or  within  a  few  years,  were  studying  the 
story  of  the  submerged  island  of  Atlantis,  and  dwelling  upon  voy- 
ages to  and  from  Carthage. 

It  may  be  here  remarked  Anthony  Bacon  was  at  Bordeaux  in 


44  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

close  intimacy  with  Michael  de  Montaigne  just  at  the  period  the 
essays  were  being  written.  It  is  possible,  from  the  striking  parallels 
which  have  been  found  between  Bacon's  essays  and  Montaigne's,  some 
collusion  or  secret  plan  was  carried  out  by  the  two  brothers.  In  1592 
Montaigne  published  his  essays ;  in  1597  Bacon  published  his.  The 
former  is  a  sort  of  French  Bacon,  the  latter  an  English  Montaigne. 
The  styles  are  undoubtedly  unlike,  but  it  is  just  possible  Montaigne 
amplified,  filled  out  or  translated  ideas  communicated  to  him  by 
his  friend,  Anthony  Bacon,  brother  to  Francis. 

It  may  rationally  be  inquired,  what  object  the  poet  had  in  intro- 
ducing in  the  play  of  TJie  Tempest  the  King  of  Naples,  and  marrying 
his  son  to  Miranda,  Prospero's  daughter  ?  In  answer  to  this  ques- 
tion it  may  be  as  well  to  point  out  that  there  is  a  powerful  under- 
current visible  in  the  play  of  VirgiVs  Art,  revealed  in  the  allusions 
to  Tunis  or  Carthage,  Dido  and  ^neas,  and  the  introduction  of 
Ariel  as  Harpy,  together  with  the  snatching  away  of  the  banquet 
set  before  the  shipwrecked  king  and  his  followers.  This  latter  inci- 
dent is  entirely  borrowed  from  the  third  book  of  the  ^neid,  which 
pictures  the  Wanderings  of  ^neas  and  his  visit  to  the  isles  of 
Strophads.  Let  us  reflect  how  much  there  is  in  this  play  of  The 
Tempest  to  recall  Virgil's  sixth  book  of  the  ^neid,  with  its  Elysian 
Fields,  or  Fortunate  Isles.  For  part  of  the  ancient  imitations  con- 
sisted in,  first,  a  descent  to  hell,  or  the  infernal  regions,  with  a 
re-birth  or  return  to  the  Elysian  Fields  or  Paradise,  which  was 
always  placed  on  an  enchanted  island.  In  this  symbolic  transition 
there  was  history  as  well  as  allegory  portrayed.  Now  the  place 
where  ^neas  is  pictured  making  his  descent  to  Avernus  (in  the  sixth 
book  of  the  ^neid)  was  at  Cumas,  on  the  coast  Euboia,  near  Naples. 
The  association  of  the  shipwrecked  Duke  of  Milan  and  Alonso, 
King  of  Naples,  with  -^neas  is  clearly  implied  by  the  text 
declaring  they  have  come  from  Tunis,  which  was  Carthage,  and  where 
JEneas  was  also  cast  awaij,  and  which,  with  the  history  of  Dido,  mingles 
so  powerfully  in  Virgil's  entire  epic.  The  two  Sicilies,  that  is,  the 
kingdom  of  Naples,  were,  so  to  speak,  the  vestibule  of  the  fabulous 
world  of  Homer  and  even  of  Virgil.  Two  historical  races  were 
placed  by  Homer  in  Sicily,  named  the  Sicani  and  the  Siceli.  It 
is  from  here  to  the  west  we  find  Homer  placing  near  to 
the  entrance  of  the  ocean  the  Cimmerians,  ''  an  unhappy 
people,  constantly  surrounded  by  thick  shadows,  and  who 
never  enjoyed  the  rays  of  the  sun."  Still  farther  away 
and  in  the  ocean  itself,  and  therefore  beyond  the  limits  of  earth 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEM ATUBE.  45 

(Europe),  the  poet  paints  for  us  a  fortunate  land,  which  he  calls 
Elysium,  where  the  elect  of  Jupiter  enjoy  a  perpetual  felicity.  The 
whole  of  Hesiod's  and  Homer's  deities  of  the  isles  and  coast  of  ocean 
— the  Hesperides,  Gorgons,  Harpies,  Cyclops,  Giants,  Laestrygonians, 
Sirens,  etc.,  belong  to  the  west  of  Europe — to  the  Atlantic  Ocean, 
heyond  the  pillars  of  Hercules.  In  all  this  we  have,  as  Bacon  asserts, 
echoes  of  traditions  from  prehistoric  times,  which  fell  into  the  pipes 
and  flutes  of  the  Greek  poets,  gathered  from  Tyrian  and  Phoenician 
navigators,  traditions  of  race  migrations,  connected  with  the  Car- 
thaginians who  traded,  according  to  Aristole,  with  the  once  existing 
island  of  Atlantis.  I  have  gone  back  to  Homer,  because  to  every 
classical  scholar  the  fact  is  known  Virgil's  Wanderings  of  JEneas  are 
in  a  great  measure  borrowed  from  the  Wanderings  of  Ulysses.^ 

Naples,  therefore,  stands  as  representative  of  Cum^,  where 
^neas  made  his  descent  into  the  infernal  regions.  Bacon,  I  suggest, 
imitates  Virgil's  plagiarisms  from  Homer  by  borrowing  again  from 
the  Roman  poet.  In  these  references  to  ^neas.  Dido,  Carthage, 
Naples,  in  The  Tempest,  the  deep  observer  may  perceive  the  hand 
of  the  same  splendid  genius  who  wrote  in  his  Advancement  of  Learn- 
ing (1605),  "  That  if  all  arts  ivere  lost  they  might  he  refound  in  Virgil, " 
and  that  other  pregnant  hint  (upon  page  95  Advancement  of  Learn- 
ing, 1640),  "  That  ancient  oracle  given  to  ^neas,  which  presaged  rest 
unto  him,  Antiquam  exquirite  matrem  (Virg.  ^n.  3),  should  be  ful- 
fill'd  upon  the  most  noble  nations  of  England  and  Scotland,  now 
united  in  that  name  oj  Britannia,  their  ancient  mother. " 

By  arts,  with  reference  to  Virgil,  Bacon  does  not  mean  solely  the 
art  of  writingpoetry  or  metre,  but  he  means  thoserecomZi7eawc?e50^mc 
doctrines  which  are  veiled  and  obscured  by  Virgil,  which  he  had 
learned  in  the  mysteries,  and  of  which  the  sixth  book  of  the  ^neid 
is  a  striking  example. 

It  is  highly  probable  the  play  of  The  Tempest  owes  part  of  its  plot 
origin  to  the  history  of  Ludovic  Sforza,  Duke  of  Milan,  who,  like  Pros- 
pero,  was  banished  by  Ms  brother^s  party,  but  afterward  became 
restored  to  his  duchy.  There  are  other  parallels  of  a  striking  char- 
acter between  the  play  and  the  history  of  this  Duke,  connected  as  it 
is  with  Naples,  which  may  interest  the  reader  if  I  give  them  here : 

"  Ludovic  Sforza  was  brother  to  Galeas  Sforza,  duke  of  Milan, 

1  Servius  writes  of  this  sixth  book  -^neid,  ^^  Totus  quidem  Virgilius  scientia 
plemis  est,  in  qua  hie  liber  possidet  principatum,  cujus  ex  Hoviero  pars  major  smnta  est. 
WMicimtiir  atiqtia  simpliciter,  mnlta  de  historia,  multa  per  altam  scientiam  philosoph- 
orum  Theologicorum  ^gyptior%m,  adeo  ut  plerique  de  his  singulis  hujus  lihri  integras 
scripserint  Ttpa^^juareia^. 


4G  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE. 

named  hy  some  John  Andrea,  whom  he  nourished  and  brought  up, 
and  slew  in  the  church  of  St.  Stephen,  in  Milan,  as  he  was  there 
present  at  the  hearing  of  mass,  albeit  they  were  both  sous  of  the 
ftimous  warrior,  Francis  Sforza.  By  the  death  of  Galeas,  a  son  of 
his  named  John,  very  young  in  years,  remained  his  successor  in  the 
tutelage  of  Bona,  his  mother,  and  of  Chico,  a  native  of  Calabria, 
who  had  been  much  favored  by  his  father  and  grandfather.  This 
Chico  immediately  banished  Ludovic,  wlio  wandered  as  a  fugitive 
through  strange  countries,  and  tasted  the  mutabilities  of  fortune.''^ 

Ludovic,  like  Prospero  in  the  play,  possessed  the  next  right  to 
the  duchy  of  Milan,  inasmuch  as  his  brother's  son,  John,  was  a 
minor,  and  at  the  least  he  held  the  right  to  the  administration  as 
regent  in  his  nephew's  favor.  Nevertheless,  he  found  means  to  re- 
turn from  his  banishment,  and,  forcibly  entering  Milan,  expelled 
Bona  and  Chico,  where  he  ruled  for  twenty  years  with  great  wis- 
dom and  spirit.  He  married  his  nephew,  the  Duke  Ferdinand,  to 
the  King  of  Naples^  daughter,  and  herein  we  may  again  perceive 
something  of  a  parallel  or  reference  in  the  play  to  this  subject.  For 
in  The  Tempest  we  not  only  have  the  King  of  Naples  introduced, 
but  his  son  Ferdinand  marries  Prospero's  daughter,  Miranda.  It 
is  certainly  very  striking  to  find  these  names  and  parallels,  although 
somewhat  altered  in  their  respective  bearings,  reflecting  closely 
each  other  both  in  the  history  and  the  play,  viz.,  a  banished  Duke 
of  Milan,  his  restoration  and  an  alliauce  by  marriage  with  Naples. 
I  have  given  the  passage,  in  inverted  commas,  as  it  stands  in  the 
Treasury  of  Ancient  and  Modern  Times  (translated  out  of  the  Span- 
ish of  Pedro  Mexia  and  Francesco  Sansovino,  laggard,  London, 
1613-1619).  The  reader  will  perceive  the  strange  introduction  of 
the  name  John  Andrea,  because  a  certain  John  Valentine  Andreas 
has  been  credited  by  De  Quincey  with  the  entire  authorship  of 
those  remarkable  Eosicrucian  Manifestoes  of  1614,  1615,  viz.:  A 
Heformation  of  the  Whole  Wide  World,  and  The  Fame  and 
Confession  of  the  Eosicrucian  Fraternity.  Is  it  just  possible  the 
poet  selected  this  historical  incident  for  the  sake  of  its  relationship 
to  the  name  of  John  Andrea  ?  I  cannot  say  I  understand  the 
passage  quoted  clearly  myself,  but  I  have  a  shrewd  suspicion  Gon- 
zalo  in  the  play  of  The  Tempest  is  a  portrait  of  John  Valentine  An- 
dreas himself,  because  the  speech  describing  a  philosophical  republic, 
or  Utopia,  is  delivered  by  Gonzalo,  and  John  Valentine  Andreas  was 
the  author  of  a  work  entitled  Christianopolitance  Bepuhlicce,  which, 
like  Sir  Thomas  More's  Utopia,  Bacon's  New  Atlantis  and  Campa- 
nella's  City  of  tJie  Sun,  is  just  such  a  vision  or  ideal  of  reformed 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITER ATUBE.  47 

society  as  pictured  by  Gonzalo.    It  may  be  observed  how  Gonzalo 
is  brought  in  with  the  usurping  Duke  of  Milan. 

The  first  Rosicrucian  manifesto,  entitled  A  Reformation  of  the 
Whole  Wide  World,  was  almost  entirely  borrowed  from  Boccalini's 
Ragguagli  di  Parnasso,  77th  advertisement.  It  is,  therefore,  well 
worthy  of  note  that  under  the  53rd  advertisement  we  find  one 
Francisco  Sforza  introduced  as  follows : 

*'  Apollo  at  last  grants  admittance  into  Parnassus  to  Francisco 
Sforza,  Duke  of  Milan,  which  he  had  long  denied  to  do,  upon  a  hard 
condition,  which  he  accepted  of." 

We  also  find  a  certain  Prospero  Colonna  admitted  into  Parnassus 
in  this  work,  on  account  of  his  extraordinary  virtues  and  literary 
acquirements.  The  reflective  reader  will,  I  am  sure,  perceive  not 
only  an  affiliation  obtaining  between  Bacon's  position  as  president 
of  the  Assizes  held  at  Parnassus  hy  order  of  the  god  Apollo  (pub- 
lished by  George  Withers,  the  poet)  and  all  this,  but  also  recognize 
the  strange  parallel  that  Prospero  in  The  Tempest  is  Duke  of  Milan. 

In  Lord  Bacon's  Essay  upon  Fame,  published  in  the  Resuscitatio 
of  1671  (part  I.,  p.  212),  there  is  the  following  passage  which 
should  be  paralleled  with  a  passage  from  the  Turris  Babel,  of  John 
Valentine  Andreas  (Strasburg,  1619). 

Bacon  writes : 

''  We  will  therefore  speak  of  these  points.  What  are  false  Fames, 
and  what  are  true  Fames;  and  how  they  may  be  best  discerned; 
how  Fames  may  be  sown  and  raised  ;  how  they  may  be  spread  and 
multiplied,  and  how  they  may  be  checked  and  laid  dead.^^ 

"  That  in  the  day  time  she  (Fame)  sitteth  in  a  Watch  Tower.  ^^ 
Now,  in  John  Valentine  Andreas'  Turris  Babel  or  Tower  of 
Babel,  he  writes  of  the  Rosicrucian  Fraternity  as  follows  : 

"  Satis  superque  hominibus  illusum  est.  Eheu,  mortales?  nihil 
est  quod  Fraternitatis  expectetis:  fabula  peracta  est.  Fama 
astruxit :  Fama  destruxit.  Fama aiebat:  Fama  negat,^^  etc.  (Page 
69.    1619.) 

''  Mankind  has  been  deceived  sufficiently,  and  more  than  enough. 
Forsooth,  mortals !  there  is  nothing  now  to  expect  of  the  Frater- 
nity. The  play  is  acted  out.  Fame  built;  Fame  demolishes  it. 
Fame  asserted  it ;  Fame  denies  it, "  etc. 

The  reader  will  perceive  Andreas  uses  almost  the  same  language 
as  Bacon.  The  Fame  of  the  Rosicrucian  Fraternity  was  sown  and 
raised  by  some  one,  who,  after  having  built  it,  checked  it  and  laid  it 
dead  by  denial.    It  may  also  be  asked  whether  Bacon,  in  placing  Fame 


48  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

in  a  Watch  Tower,  is  not  giving  us  an  indirect  hint  by  parallel  for 
the  Turris  Babel  of  John  Yal.  Andreas  ?  Of  the  latter's  direct  impU- 
cation  in  the  authorship  of  these  Rosicrucian  manifestoes,  I  think 
the  following  passage,  which  I  borrow  from  his  Mythologia  Christi- 
ana, 1619,  will  be  sufficient.  He  introduces  Alethea  (Truth) 
declaring : 

"  Planissime  nihil  cum  hac  Fraternitate  commune  habeo.  Nam 
cum  paulo  ante  lusum  quendam  ingeniosorum  personatus  aliquis  in 
literario  foro  agere  vellet  credidissem,  hac  imprimis  a^tate,  qua)  ad 
insolita  quseque  se  arrigit,  nihil  mora  dum  LibeUis  inter  se  con- 
iiictantibus,  sed  velut  in  scena  prodeuntes  subinde  alios  histriones 
non  sine  voluptate  spectavi.  At  nunc,  cum  theatrum  omne  variis 
opinionumjurgiis  impleatur,  et  conjecturis  et  suspicionibus  maledi- 
centia  potissimum  pugnetur,  subduxi  ego  me,  ne  imprudentius  me 
ulli  rei  incertae  et  lubricai  immiscerim. '' 

''  Most  assuredly  I  (Alethea)  have  nothing  in  common  with  this 
Fraternity.  For,  when  a  short  time  back,  I  believed  some  on  the 
literary  stage  were  performing  a  piece  of  certain  ingenious  parties, 
I  was,  especially  in  this  age,  which  attaches  itself  principally  to 
new-fangled  notions  with  avidity,  a  looker-on,  and  not  without  a 
certain  degree  of  enjoyment,  at  the  Battle  of  the  Books,  and  the 
scene  with  its  subsequent  entire  change  of  actors.  But  now,  when 
the  theater  is  filled  with  altercation  and  a  diversity  of  opinion,  and 
the  fight  is  carried  on  by  innuendoes  and  malevolent  conjectures,  I 
have  withdrawn  myself,  that  I  may  not  be  imprudently  mixed  up  in 
a  matter  uncertain  and  slippery. '' 

It  may  be  noted  from  this  passage  that  the  author  employs  met- 
aphors of  language  borrowed  from  the  theater  and  stage. 


^/■^'^ 


<., 


t  N  S  TAVKrMXGTM^H 


48  OfTheAdvancement 


C  A  P.  VII. 

The  Dignity  of  Learning  from  humane  Arguments  and  Tcftimonics. 
I.  Naturall  Inventours  of  New  x^rts  for  the  Commodities  of 
Mans  life,c9nfecrated  as  Gods,  1 1.  Politicall,C/i>ii?  EftAtes  and  Af- 
faires advanced  by  Learning,  ^  the  beft  and  happieft  times  under 
Learned  Princes  andothers,  §  Exemplified  in  the  immediat  fuC" 
ceeding  Emperor Sy  from  the  death  of  Domitian.  III.  Military, 
The  concurrence  of  Armes  and  Learning  ^  ^  Exemplified  in  Alex  • 
ander  the  Great.  ^  lulius  Casfar  the  Dilhtor,  §  Xenophon 
ihi:  Philofopher. 

S  for  Humane  Tefiimmies  and  .Argument sy  k  is  fo 
large  a  fields  as  in  ^  difcourfe  of  this  compendious 
nature  and  brevity^  it  is  fit  rather  to  ufe  choice?  than 
to  imbrace  the  variety  of  them* 

I.     Firft  therefore  in  the  degrees  of  Honor  amongft  the 
Heathensj  it  was  the  higheft>  to  attain  to  a  Veneration  and 
Adoration  as  a  Godj  this  indeed  to  the  Chriftians  is  as  the 
forbidden  fruitj  but  we  fpeak  now  feparately  of  Humane 
Teftimony.  Therefore,  (  as  wc  were  faying)  with  the 
Heathens,  that  which  the  Grecians  call  c/4p<?r/j^<3/r.  and  the 
Herodia.l.4Latines  Helatio  inter  Dittos -^  was  the  fupreme  Honour 
DicRcU-  vvhichman  could  attribute  unto  Man;  fpecially,   when  it 
^**  w^s  given,  not  by  a  formall  Decree  or  Ad  of  Eftate,  (as  it 

>^as  ufed  amongft  the  Roman  Emperors,)  but  freely  by  the 
aflentofMen  and  inward  beliefc.  Ofwhichhigh  Honour 
there  was  a  certain  degree  and  midle  terme:  For  there  were 
reckoned  above  Humane  Honours^  Honours  Heroicall-^  and  D/-. 
yine^  in  the  Diftribution  whereof,  Antiquity  obferved  this 
order.  Founders  of  StateSjLawgiversjExtirpers  of  Tyrants^ 
Fathers  of  their  Country,  and  other  eminent  Perfons  in  Ci* 
vile  Merit,  were  honoured  with  the  title  of  Worthies  only,  or 
Demi'GodS'^  Inch  as  were  Thefeus^  Minos ^  "Rpmult*^-,  and  the 
like,  on  the  other  fide  fuch  as  were  Inipentors  and  Authors  of 
new  ArtS'^  and  fuch  as  endowed  mans  life  with  new  Commodities^ 
and afcejiims were  eyereonfecratedamongthe  greater  and  En^ 

tira 


Of   Learning.     Lib.   L 


49 


tire  GfldS'j  which  hapned  to  Ceres^  Bacchw^  Mercury^  .yipollo^ 
and  others,  which  indeed  was  done  jiiftly  and  upon  found 
judgement.  For  the  merits  of  the  former^  arc  commonly  con- 
fined wichin  the  circle  of  an  Agcdr  a  Nation,  and  are  hot 
unhke  (eafonablc  and  favoring  fhowers,  which  though 
they  be  profitable  and  defirable,  yet  ferve  but  for  that  feafon 
only  wherein  they  fall,  and  for  a  Latitude  of  ground  which 
th^y  \j\j2iX.tx:  Lut  the  benefices  of  the  latter^  Hke  the  influences 
oftheSunne,  and  the  heavenly  bodies,  are  for  time,  perma- 
nentj  for  place,  univerfall;  thofe  again  are  commonly  mixt 
with  ftrife  and  perturbatiouj  but  thefe  have  the  true  chara- 
cter of  Divine  prefencc,  and  come  in  Aura  leni  without 
noife  or  agitation, 

11,     Neither  certainly  is  the  Merit  of  Learning  in  Qiyile 
affair es-i  and  in  repr/fiwg  the  inconveniences  which  growfrofn 
man  to  fnan^  much  inferior  to  the  other  xi^hich  felieye  mans  necef- 
fities^vphich  arife  frm  Nature.    And  this  kind  of  merit  \Vas 
lively  fet  forth  in  that  iained relation  of  Orpheui  Theatre^^hWodAn 
where  all  beafis  and  birds  aflcmbledjWhich  forgetting  their  ^'^P^* 
propet  naturall  appetites  of  Prey ,  of  Game,  of  Quarrell, 
flood  all  iociably  and  lovingly  together^  liftning  (into  the 
Aires  and  accords  of  theharpej  the  (bund  whereof  no  foo- 
liercea{ed,orwasdrown'dbyfbmelowdernoife,but  eve- 
ry beaft  returned  to  kis  own  nature.  In  which  Fable  is  ele- 
gantly deicribed,  the  nature  and  condition  of  men,  who  are 
tofledand  difordered  with  fundry  favageandunreclaim'd 
defireSjof  ProfcofLuft,  of  Revenge  5  w^hichyetaslongas 
they  giveeare  to  preceptS)  to  the  perfwafion  ofi  Religion," 
Lawe^)  and  Magiftratess  eloquently  and  fweetly  coucht  in 
Bookes,to  5crnions  and  Harangesj  fo  long  is  fbciety  and 
peace  maintaind-  but  if  thefe  inftruments  be  filent?  or  that 
(editions  and  tumults  make  tKem  not  audible »  all  things 
diflolve  and  fall  back  into  Anarchy  andConfufion. 

§     But  this  appeareth  more  manifeftly,  phen  Kings  or 
^erfofis  of  Authority  under  them, or  other  §oyernors  iff  States^ 
are  endowedmth  LearningiVdi  although  he  mightbe  thought 
partialltQ  his  own  profefsion  that  faid  Than  Jhotdd  People  or  Plato  <Jc 
i!-  Q  Statci^'^'^' 


5t  Of  The  Advancement 


States  be  happy  when  either  Kings  were  Philofuphers  ar 
Philofophers  Kings -^  yec  fo  much  is  verified  by  experi- 
ence >  that  under  wife  and  Learned  Princes  and  governors  of 
State ^  there  hath  bin  eyer  the  befl  and  happiefi  times.  For  how- 
foever  Kings  may  have  their  errors  and  imperfe(5lionsj  that 
is,behableco  Pafsionsand  depraved  cuftomes,  hke  other 
me,yet  if  they  be  illuminated  by  Learning,  they  have  certain 
anticipate  notions  of  Rehgion,  PoHcy,  and  Morahty,which 
preferve  and  refrain  them  from  all  ruinous  and  peremptory 
errors  and  exceffes ,  whifpering  evermore  in  their  eares, 
when  Councellors,  and  Servants  ftand  mute  and  filent .  So 
hkcwiCc  Senators  and  Councelloi^  which  be  Learned,  doe  pro- 
ceed upon  more  fafe  andfubftantiallprinciplesi  than  Councellors 
which  are  only  men  of  experience:  Thofe  (eeing  dangers  a  farre 
ofF,and  repulfing  them  betimes- whereas  thele  are  wife  only 
neere  at  hand,  Teeing  nothing,  but  what  is  imminent  and 
ready  to  fall  upon  them,  and  thantruft  to  the  agility  of  their 
witj  in  the  point  of  dangers,to  ward  and  avoid  them. 

§     Which  felicity  of  times  under  L^^r«^^ 'Tnwf^x   (to 

keep  ftill  the  law  of  brevity  by  ufing  the  mod  feleded  an  d  e- 

minentexamplesj  doth  beft  appear,  in  the  Age  which  paf- 

fed  from  the  death  of  D(}w/f/\^i«  the  Emperor,  untill  the 

raigne  o(  Qommodtn,  comprehending  afuccefiion  of  fixe  Princes 

aU  Lear nedior  lingular  favourers  and  advancers  of  Learning, 

and  of  all  ages(ifwe  regard  temporal!  happineffe)  the  moTtflcri^^ 

ing  that  eyer  Romefaw^  whit  h  was  then  the  Modell  and  Epitome  of 

the  world:  A  matter  revealed  and  prefigured  unto  Domitian  in 

Suet,  in    a  dream,  the  night  before  he  was  flaine,  for  he  feem'd  to  fee 

Dom  parag^^^g,^  y^hiy^il  f^pg^  his  fhoulders  a  neck  and  a  head  of  gold; 

^'  which  Divination  came  indeed  accordingly  to  paffc,  in 

thofe  golden  times  which  lucceededj  of  which  we  will 

imakefome  particular,  but  brief  commemoration.  l<Jerya 

was  a  Learned  Prince,  an  inward  acquaintance,  arid  even  a 

Difciple  to  ApoQonita  the  Pythagorean;  who  alio  almoft  ex- 

.  pired  in  a  verfc  ofHomers, 

DioH,  1. 68.  Telis  *Th*/be  tms^  lachrimUS  ulcifcere  noflras 

Plin.Pan.    Tr/?j<^»  wasforhis  Perfonnot  Learned,  but  an  admirer  of 

Learn- 


Of  LEARNiNfG.     Lib.   L  51 

Learning,  and  a  naunificeiit  benefa<5bol:  to  the  Learned,  a 
Founder  of  Libraries,  and  iii  whole  Court  (though  a  war- 
like Prince)  as  is  recorded^  Profeffors  and  Preceptors  were 
of  moft  credit  and  eftiitiatioii.  Adrian  was  the  moft  curious  ^l^""*  ^^ 
man  that  lived,  and  the  infatiable  inquirer  of  all  variety  and 
Iccrets.   Anconmus  had  the-.patient  and  fubtilc  wit  of  a 
^choole-man,  in  fo  much  as  he  was  called  Cjmitti-ScSlor^  ^  Dion,  in 
Career  ^or  a  diyider  of  Cummin-feed:  And  of  the  Dm  fratres^^^^^'  ^' 
Luctui  Commodus  was  delighted  witha  fofter  kind  of  Learn- 
ingj  and  Marcm  was  furnarn'd  the  Philofdpber .  Thefe  Trtn- 
cesas  they  ecccel'dthe  re^  iH  Learnings  fo  they  excdl^d  them  like- 
'tpifemyirtue md goodnefe.  Nerioa  was  a  moft  mild  Empe- 
rour^and  u>ha  (if  he  had  done  nothing  elfc)  gaye  Trajan  tovMn.Vm. 
theWorld.  Tr^j^^,  ©fall  that  raigned,  for  the  Arts,  both  of^JJ^*^**^- 
Peace  and  Warre,  was  moft  famous  and  renowned ;  the  * 
(ame  Prince  enlarged  the  bounds  of  the  Empircj  the  fanie,  Xyphil.  ek 
temperately  confind  the  Limits  arid  Powei:  thereof j  he  wa^  jraSn.. 
lalfo  a  great  Buildet  in  (b  mudi  as  Qonfiantinnhc  Great,  in  e- 
mulation  was  wont  to  call  him^Pariaanity  Wall- F lower ^bc^ 
caufe  his  name  was  carved* upon  fo  mjmy  walls.  Adrian 
vwas  Times  rivall  for  the  vi<5tory  ofpe'rpetttity>forby  his  care 
and  munificence  in  every  kind,  he  repaired  the  decaies  and 
.rumcs  of  Time.  Anton  inus,  as  by  name,  lo  nature,a  man  ^    .  • 
exceeding  Pi<?iiy>  for  his  nature  and  inbred|  goodnefle,  vvasinArit>; 
.beloved  and  moft  acceptable  to  meri  of  all  forts  and  degrees; 
whofe  raigne,  though  it  was  long,  yet  was  it  peacfefull  and 
happy.  Luaw  Commodm  (exceeded  indeed  by  his  brother) m  Vcro. 
.^xceldmanyoftheEmperours  for  goodneffe.  Marcus  for-inM.Ant. 
•med  by  nature  to  be  the  pattern  and  Platfbrme  of  virtue,  a- 
gainft  whom  that  le^er  in  the  banquet  of  the  Gods  had  no  • 
.thing  to  objedtjOr  c2irftSitfarjf>ehispatiencetowards  the  humors luVuni  C»i 
if  his  wife.  5o  in  this  continued  fe^uence  of /^^  *Tri»r^x,  ^f^r^; 
fnanmay  fee  thehappy  fruits  of  Learning  in  Sdyeraignty^  Pain- 
ted forth  in  the  greateftTable  of  the  world. 

JIT-  Neither  hath  Learning  ah  influence  or  operation 
upon  Qiyill  merit  and  the  Arts  of  Peace  only^  but  likewiie  it 
hath  no  leffe  Power  and  Efficacy  in  Martiall  and  Military 

G  2  >/rf«^ 


Of  The  Advancembnt 


Wtue^^s  may  notably  bereprefcnted  in  the  examples  of  A- 
iexander  the  Greatj  and  lulm  C^far  the  DiUator^  mention'd 
by  theway  befote,  but  now  in  fit  place  to  be  refumedj  oi 
wholfi  Military  'virtues  andA^s  in  warre^  there  needs  no  note 
oirecitall,  having  bin  the  wonders  of  the  world  in  that 
kind- butjof  Ji&^ir  affeSiionand  prgpef^ficm  towards  Learning^ 
and  peculiar  perfedimtherein^  it  will  not  be  impertinent  to 
fay  lomething. 

§     ^/^x^w^^r  was  bred  arid  taught  under  Ariflotley  (cer- 
tainly a  great  Philofopher)  who  dedicated  diverfe  of  his 
Books  of  ^bilofophy  unto  him;  he  wa^  attended  with  Qa-^ 
liUhencs ^^nddiyctk  otheE  Learned  perfons  that  followed 
him  in  Campe, and  were  his  perpetuall  affociatesj  in  all  his 
Travailes  and  Conquefts.  What  Pric^  and  Eflimation  he  had 
L^^W«^m,  doth  notably  appear  in  many  particularsj  as  in 
the  envy  he  exprcfled  towards  AchiUe*^  great  fortune,in  this, 
Pluc  in      That  he  hadfogeoda  Trumpet  of  hit  Anions  (Ufproyefe  oj  Homers 
Alcxand.    yerfesAn  the  judgement  he  gave  touching  th^ precious  Cabinet 
^D^r /w,which  was  found  amongft  the  reft  of  the  fpoiles; 
whereof}  when queftion  was  mov'd,  what  thing  was  wor« 
thy  to  be  put  into  it>  and  one  faid  one  thing,  another,  ano- 
Plut.ut      thtv ^  he  gaye  fentence  for  Homers  works.  His  reprehenforic 
"^"*        letter  to  Arifflotle,  after  he  had  fet  forth  his  ^ook  of  Nature^ 
<  wheiwin  he  expoftulates  with  him,  for  puUiftiing  the  fe- 
crets  artnyfteries  of  Philofophy,  andgavehim  tounder- 
Vtfupra.    flandj  That  himfelfeeflimedit  more  to  excell  others  in  Learn- 
ing and  Knowledge ^than  ini  Power  and  Empire,     There  are 
many  other  particulars  to  this  purpofc.  But  how  excellently 
huinind  was  endowed  with  Learnings  doth  appear,  or  rather 
fhine  in  all  his  Speeches  and  <i«/B?^rx,fullof  knowledg  &  wif- 
domcj  whereoHhough  the  Remain  es  be  fmalU  yet  you  flial 
find  deeply  imprefled  in  them,  the  foot-fteps  of  all  fciences 
in  Moral  knowledge;  Let  thejpeech  of  Alexander  be  obferved 
touching  Diogenes  ^3c  iee(if  yee  plcafe)if  it  tend  not  to  the  true 
eftate  of  one  of  the  greateft  queftions  in  morall  Philofophy? 
whether  the  enjoying  of  outward  thingsyor  th^  contemning  ofthemy 
be  the  greater  happinejfeJcox  when  he  faw  .Diogenes  emtented 

with 


Of  Learning,     Lib.  L  5j 

tPfth  /q  litki  turning  to  thofe  that  flood  about  jiim,  chat 
niock»t  at  the  Cyniques  condition,  he  faid,  Jf  Iw^re  n(^t  J-  Vtfuprai 
kxanderyj could  mjh  to  be  Diogenes,  But  Sen.ecaty  in  this  com- 
parifonjpieferies  Diogenesy  when  he  faith,  Piu$  erat  quodOeBcn-  J 
Piogenes  noUet  mcipere ,  qmm  quod  Alexander  pojfet  dare-^ 
There  were  more  things  which  Diogenes  would  haye  refu/ed,  than 
tbofe  were  which  Alexander  could  hayegiyen.  Jn  Natural!  hnaw^ 
ledge  J  obferve  that  fpeech  that  was  ufuall  with  h  im^  Thaf  Plut.  In 
be  felt  his  mortality  chiefly  in  two  things^  Jleep^and  Lufl:  which  ^^^^^^* 
fpeech,  in  truth,  is  extradted  out  of  the  depth  of  Natural] 
Phil^fophy,  tafting  rather  of  the  conception  of  an  Arijiotlept 
^Democrituf^  than  ^a  Alexander^  feeing  as  well  the  indi- 
gence, as  redundance  of  nature,  defign'd  by  thefe  two  A<5ls, 
^re,as  it  wercjthe  inward  witnefies  and  the  carneft  of  Death. 
In  P^ejy,  let  that  fpeech  be  obferved,  when  upon  the  bleed- 
ing of  his  woundes,  he  called  unto  him  one  of  his  Flatterers, 
that  was  vvont  to  af^ribe  unto  him  divine  h6nor;  look  (faith  Vt  Sipn^ « 
he)  thUifthe  blood  of  a  many  notfuch  liquor  as  Homer  Jpeaks  of^  ^^^^^* 
i^kifhranne from  Fepi^  handyj^ben  it  was  pierced  by  Diomedes: 
with  this  fpeech  checking  both  the  Poets ^  and  his  flatterers 
and  himfelfe.  Jn  Logiq^e  obferve  that  reprehenfion  of  Dia,- 
le^ique  Fallacies Ati  repelling  and  retorting  Arguments)  in 
that  faying  of  his  wherein  he  takes  up  Cajfander^  confuteing 
the  in  formers  again  ft  his  rather  M«^/^/i^^r»  For  when  Alex- 
ander hapned  to  fay,  Doe  you  think  thefe  men  would  come  fo  Plut.  in 
farreto  complain^  except  they  had  jufi  caufe^    Caflander  an*^^^^"^* 
fwered)  Tea^  that  was  it  thai  made  them  tbm  bold,  becaufe  they 
hoped  the  length  of  the  way  would  dead  the  difioyeryofthe  ajperfi^ 
on-^  See  (faith  the  King )  the  fubtlety  of^riflotle  wrefting  the 
matter  bothwaies^n^ro  and  Contra,  Yet  the  fame  Art  which 
he  reprehended  in  another,  he  knevV  well  hovV  toule  him^ 
felfe,whenoccafion  required,  to  fervehis  own  turne.  For 
fo  it  fell  out  that  Califthenes,   ( to  whom  he  bare  a  fccrec 
grudge ,  bedaufe  he  was'againft  the  new  ceremony  of  his  a- 
doration)  being  movM,  at  a  banquet)  by  fome  of  thofe  that 
fate  at  table  with  him,  that  for  entertainraentfake(  being  he 
was  an  eloquent  man)  he  would  take  upon  him  forae 

G  J  Theame  > 


54 


Ot  The  Advancement 


Theme,  at  his  own  choices  toMcoiirfe  upon,  which  Calh 
Uhenes  did^  and  chufcing  the   PraifesoFthe  Macedonian 
Nation,  performed  the  fame  With  the  great  applaiifepf  all 
that  heard  him.  whereupon  Alexander^  nothing  pleafed^ 
Plutarch.    ^^^^>  ^'^^^  ^P^^  ^  goodfuhjeSi  it  mas  cajj  fir  afly  man  ta  be  elo- 
ut  fiipra.     {^uenti  but  tur ne,  faid  he,  your  ftile,  and  let  us  hear  what  you 
can  iay  againft  us.  Califthenes  undertook  the  ckarge,  and 
performed  it>  with  that  fting  Sc  lifcthat  Alexander  was  fainc 
to  interrupt  him^fayingj  AnillmindalfoxuweUai  agoodcaufh 
might  infufe  eloquence,   For  Rhetorique yWhcvcto  Tropes  and 
Ornaments  appertaincj  fee  an  elegant  ufe  of  Metaphor, 
wherewith  he  tajred  Antipater^  who  was  an  Jmperious  and 
Tyrannous  Governor.  For  when  one  of  Antifaters  friends 
commended  him  to  ^Alexander  for  his  moderation ,  and 
that  he  did  not  degenerate?  as  other  Lief-tenants  did,  Into 
the  Perfian  Pridc»  m  ufcmg  Purple^but  kept  the  ancient  Ma- 
Plutarch,    cedon  habit ,  But  Anttpater  (faith  Alexander)  ts  aU  Purple 
Did.Not.  within.   So  iikewife  that  other  Metaphons  excellent^  vvheii 
Parmenio  came  unto  him  in  the  plain  ofArbella-^  and  fhewcd 
him  the  innumerable  multitude  of  cnimies  which  viewed 
in  the  night?  reprefented,  by  the  infinite  number  of  lights,  a 
new  Firmament  of  ilavresj  and  thereupon  advifed  him  to 
I»\ut in  A-.  affaile  cnem  by  night,  /  rpiO  not-,  faid  Alexander,  fiealea  yi* 
Icxan.       ^ory.     For  matter  cf  Policy ^  weigh  that  grave  and  wife  di- 
fltnclion,  which  all  ages  have  imbraced,  whereby  hc<liffi*- 
renced  his  two  chief  friends>  Epheflion  and  Cratertu^v^htxi 
Vtfupra.    \i^(gi\6^Thatthe  one  ioyed  Alexander,  and  the  other  looped  the 
King^  Defcribeing  a  Difference  of  great  import,  amongit 
even  the  mod  faithful!  fervants  of  Kings,  that  fome  infincere 
affe^ion  loloe  their  Terfons ,  others  in  duty  loye  their  Crowns. 
Obfervehow  excellently  he  could  taxe  an  error,  ordinary 
with  CounfiUors  of  Princes,  who  many  times  give  counfjH, 
according  to  the  modellof  their  own  mind  and  fortune, 
and  not  of  their  Mafters.  For  when  Darim  had  made  great 
plut.  in     oScr s  to  Alexander:   I ^faid  Parmenio^  vould  accept  thefe  con* 
^^^^'        ditions^ifjwere  (ts  Alexander,  faid  Alexander  Jiirelyfo  would  1^ 
were  las  *Tarmenio,  Laftly,  weigh  that  quick  and  acute  re^ 

ply 


Of  Learning.    Lib.  li 


5i 


ply?  which  he  made  to  his  friends  asking  him,  n;hat  he  would ^  r 
refirye fir  hmfelfigiyingaxifaj  Jo  many  and  great  guift  SI  Hope  ^ 
laid  hci  as  one  who  well  knew  that  when  all  accounts  are 
caft  up  aright,  Hope  is  the  true  portion  and  inheritance  of  all  * 

chat  refolve  upon  great  enterprizcs.  This  was  JuHni  Q^^er's 
portion  when  he  went  into  QauH^  all  his  eftate  being  exhau- 
fiedbyprofufeLargeffes.  This  was  likewife  the  portion 
of  that  noble  Princejhowfoevertranfported  vvich  Ambiti- 
onj  Henry  Duke  of(juyfe^  of  whom  it  \a  as  ufually  fsLid^.That  S-  Frar. 
he  wcu  the  greateft  ufurer  in  all  France^  becaufe  that  all  hu  ^^^^^ 
wealth  was  in  nameSi  and  that  he  had  turned  his  wkle  eftate  into 
obligations.  But  the  admiration  of  ?/?w  *Trince  whirftl  re- 
prefenthim  to  my  felfe,  not  as  Alexandi*  the  Greats  but  as 
Jriflotles  SchoUer^hsLih  perchance  carried  me  toofarre. 

§     As  for  luliui  Ccefar  the  excellency  rfhu  Learnings  needs  Cic.  dc  cl* 
not  to  be  argued?  either  from  his  education,  or  his  compa-^^^^*  ^^ 
ny^or  his  anfwersj  For  this,  in  a  high  degree?  do:h  declare  it  rat.i.  j. 
felfe  in  his  own  writings?  and  works,  whereof  fome  are  ex-  Saetinlul. 
cant?iome  unfortunately  perifh't.    For  firft;  there  is  left  un- 
to wsthat  excellent  Hi  ftory  of  his  own  war  res  y  which  he  entitled 
only  a  CoMMbNTARV;  wherein  all  lucceeding  times  have  Suet,  m 
admired  the  folid  waight  of  matter;  and  lively  images  ofP^"2'5<^- 
Actions  and  Perfons,  expreft  in  the  greateft  propriety  of 
words?andperfpicuityofNarration,that  ever  was.  Which 
endowments  J  that  they  were  not  infufed  by  nature)  but  ac- 
quired by  Precepts  andinftruUions  of  Learning^  is  well  wic 
ncflcd  by  that  work  of  his  entitled  De  Analogia,  which  Parag.5tf, 
was  nothing  elfe  but  a  Qrammaticall  Phihfophy^  wherein  he 
did  labour,  to  make  this,  T?OA}^fi^P/^a>M?Mi  to  become  yox  ad 
Licitum,  and  to  reduce  cuftome  of  fpeech>   to  congruity  of 
fpeechjthatwords?whicharethe  images  of  things,  might 
accord  with  the  things  themfelves?  and  not  ftand  to  the  Ar- 
bitrementofthe  vulgiir.  So  likewife  we  have  by  his  edi6t> 
a  reformed computiitionoftheyearycotTcCfondcntiQ  the  courfc  ^^^^  ^j. 
of  the  Sunne-  which  evidently  (hewes,  rhat  he  accounted  it  parag.46, 
his  ecjuall  glory?  to  finde  out  the  lawes,of  the  ftarres  ia  hea- 
vcnj  as  to  give  lawcs  to  men  on  earth.  So  in  that  Book  of 

bis 


56  Op  The  Advancement 

Plut.  in     his  entitled  AnITI-Catoj  it  doth  eafily  appear  >  that  he  did 
Cxliu       afpire,as  well  to  vidtory  of  vVitj  as  victory  of  warre^underta- 
king  therein  a  Conflict  againff  th^  greateft  Champion 
with  the  Penne,thatthenklivedjC/V(fro  thd  Oratour,  Agai  ne  in 
his  Book  of  Apophthegmes,  which  he  colkiSledj  we  fee 
he  eftimed  it  more  honour,  to  make  himfelfe  but  a  paire 
of  Tables,  or  Codicills,  wherein  to  regifter  the  wife  and 
graVe  fayings  of  others^  then  if  his  own  words  were  hal- 
lowed as  Oracles ,  as  many  vain  Princes  by  cuftome  of 
Flattery,  delight  to  doe.  But  if  I  fhovjld  report  diverfe  of 
his  Speeches y^jis  I  did  in  xAlexander^  they  are  truly  luch,  as 
Ecclcf.  la.Salomon  notes, "X^^r^^  SapienUm  funt  tanqmm  aculeiy  ^ 
tanquam  clavi  maltum  defixi :vA\crcfovc  I  will  here  only  pro- 
pound three,  not  fo  admirable  for  elegancy,  as  for  vigor  and 
efficacy; As  firft,  it  is  reafon  he  be  thought  a  matfterrfwordsy 
that  could  with  one  W;ord  appeafe  a  mutiny  in  his  army  • 
the  occafion  was  this-  The  Romans,  when  their  Generalls 
did  fpeak  in  their  Army  did  ufe  the  word,  Militesy  when 
the  Magiftratesfpake  to  th«  people,  they  didufe  the  word, 
§luirites:  C^fars  fouldiers  were  in  a  tumult,  and  feditioufly 
prayed  to  be  cafTed ,  not  that  they  fo  ment ,  but  by  cxpoftu- 
lation thereof,  to  draw  C^far  to  other  conditions^ //^,  no- 
thingdaantedand  refblute,  after  fomefilence  began  thus 
Suct.inlul.  Egpy  G^rites%  which  word  did  admit  them  aljready  caffee- 
P^g7®*   rcdi  vvherewith  the  foUldiers  werefo  furprized,  and  fo  a- 
niazedja$  they  would  not  fuffer  him  togoe  on  in  his  fpeech- 
andrelincjuifliing  theirdemands  ofDifmifiitm,  made  it  now 
their  carneftfuit,  that  the  name  of  Milites^  nilght  be  again 
reflored  them.  The  fecond  fpeech  was  thusj    Ccefar  did  ex- 
treamlyaffed  the  name  of  iC/^g-j  therefore  fome  were  fet 
on,  as  he  parted  by,  in  popular  acclamation  to  falute  him 
'King!  he  finding  the  crie  weak  and  poore,  put  off  the  matter 
Suct.parag.  with  a  jeft,  as  itthey  had  mift  his  fur-name,  ^m  ^ex  fum^ 
7i»  (  faith  ht)fedQ<6piry  indeedfuch  a  fpeech  as  if  it  be  exadly 

fearcht,  the  life  and  fiilnefle  of  it  can  fcarce  be  expreft.  For 
firft  it  pretended  a  refufall  of  the  name,  but  yet  not  ferious; 
againit  did  carry  with  it  an  infinite  confidence,  and  magna-^ 
'  ,nimity- 


CHAPTER  II. 
Bacon's  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640. 


'^^ Another  erro)  induced  hj  the  former  is,  a  suspicion  and  diffidence,  that  anything 
should  he  noiv  to  be  found  ont,  which  the  world  should  have  missed  and  passed 

OVER  so  LONG  TIME."  — P.  36,  ADVANCEMENT  OF  LEARNING,  1640. 

In  Lord  Bacon's  Distribution  Preface  of  the  Advancement  of 
Learning,  1640,  lie  explains  the  scope,  end  and  divisions  of  his 
Instauration,  which  he  divides  into  six  parts.  Of  these  we  only 
possess  the  three  first  completed  parts.  A  mystery  pertaining  both 
to  language  and  Bacon's  intentions  surrounds  the  fourth  part,  as 
also  the  fifth  and  sixth.  The  fourth  part  was  to  consist  of  Examples 
of  Inquisition  and  of  Invention,  which  Bacon  suspiciously  terms 
"  T7/pes  and  platforms,  which  may  present  as  it  were,  to  the  eye,  the 
ivhole  procedure  of  the  mind,  and  the  continued  fabric  and  order  of 
invention  in  certain  selected  subjects  ;  and  they  various  and  of  remark. 
For  it  came  into  our  mind,  that  in  Mathematics,  the  frame  stand- 
ing, the  demonstration  inferred  is  facile  and  perspicuous  ;  on  the  con- 
trary, without  t)iis  accommodation  and  dependency,  all  seems  involved 
and  more  subtle  than  indeed  they  be."  (Pp.  35,  36,  Distribution 
Preface,  1640.) 

It  is  plain  from  this  passage  the  Examples  Bacon  alludes  to 
are  closely  connected  with  mathematics.  Inasmuch  as  theory  is 
always  necessary  to  discovery,  and  hypothesis  is  the  first  step  to 
finding  the  true  terms  of  induction,  and  inasmuch  as  the  1623  Folio 
and  Bacon's  Advancement  of  Learning  are  both  largely  mispaged, 
the  question  arises,  is  there  no  possible  connection  between  the  lan- 
guage quoted  above  and  this  mispaging?  It  is  certain,  if  a  cipher 
be  introduced  by  means  of  mathematics  and  dates,  Shakespeare's 
age  when  he  died  would  be  the  most  simple  and  pointed  way  of  ex- 
pressing Shakespeare.  It  is,  therefore,  very  striking  to  find  the 
first  pages  mispaged  in  Bacon's  Advancement  of  Learning  of  1640 
are  52,  53,  which  represent  Shakespeare's  age  1616,  as  re- 
corded upon  his  monument  at  Stratford.  Directly  we  turn 
to    the    Folio    1623    plays,    we    find    the    only    four    entries   of 

4  49 


50  TSE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE. 

the  word  "  Bacon "  upon  pages  53  Merry  Wives  of  Wind- 
sor and  53  1st  King  Henry  IV.,  and  upon  page  52  1st  King  Henry 
IV.  (mispaged  54). i  I  think,  therefore,  it  is  important  the  closest 
possible  examination  should  be  given  to  everything  recorded  by 
Bacon  upon  the  mispaging  of  his  Advancement,  1G40.  I,  therefore, 
give  the  pages  48  to  56  in  fac-simile  reproduction,  whereby  not 
only  the  mispaging,  but  the  extraordinary  system  of  italicizing  may 
be  studied.  If  Lord  Bacon  wrote  the  plays  ascribed  to  Shake- 
speare with  a  view  to  revelation  of  their  real  authorship  by  poster- 
ity, nothing  would  be  more  probable  than  that  he  should  furnish  a 
key  work  to  their  unlocking.  The  question  is,  are  the  ''  Examples 
of  Inquisition  and  Invention,^^  to  which  mathematics  are  to  be  ap- 
plied (evidently;  in  some  way  by,  *'  demonstration,  facile  and  per- 
spicuous "),  the  1623  Folio  plays?  Is  the  mysterious  expression, 
"  The  frame  standing,  ^^  a  subtle  hint  for  the  margin  of  the 
letter-press  carrying  the  paging  as  a  portrait  in  the  frame  f 
Thus,  52,  53  woald  stand  for  Shakespeare,  1616;  55,  56  for  Lord 
Bacon  at  the  same  date,  1616 ;  62,  63  for  Lord  Bacon,  1623.  It  will 
be  noticed  the  mispaging  53  does  actually  mask  the  real  55  on  the 
reproduced  page.  Shakespeare  and  Bacon  are  thus,  as  it  were, 
identified  by  mathematics,  the  false  paging  53  supplanting  the  real  55, 
which  latter  was  Bacon's  full  or  completed  years,  1616.  We  all  have 
two  ages ;  that  is,  the  years  completed  and  the  year  entered.  To  the 
thoughful  reader  two  numbers  like  these,  employed  as  cipher,  (mis- 
paging, or  otherwise),  would  greatly  assist  discovery  by  double 
repetition,  and  assist  induction.  It  is  for  this  reason,  I  have 
already  suggested,  we  find  Troilus  and  Cressida  omitted  from  the 
1623  catalogue  of  the  plays,  thus  giving  the  two  numbers  35,  36. 
It  may  be  remarked  the  passage  of  the  Preface,  from  which  we  quote 
as  to  the  Examples  of  Inquisition  and  Invention,  is  upon  pages  35. 
36.  All  this  has  already  been  discussed  in  my  work  Hermes 
Stella,  but  without  any  fac-simile  lithographs  of  the  pages,  which  I 
now  reproduce.  As  the  translation  or  English  version  of  the  1623 
Be  Augmentis  is  an  excessively  rare  work  to  obtain,  I  have  thought 
it  as  well  to  reproduce  some  of  its  pages  here.  The  reader  is,  there- 
fore, in  the  position  of  having  the  work  itself  before  his  eyes. 

The  profound  student  will  recognize  the  extraordinary  force  of 

1  The  mispaging  commences  in  the  play  upon  page  47,  which  will  be  found 
mispaged  49,  the  previous  page  being  46.  This  error  is  carried  on  continuously, 
and,  if  corrected,  reduces  page  54  to  52,  page  53  to  51. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  51 

the  hint  BacoD  gives  us  in  these  Learned  Princes,  upon  pages  52 
(false),  51,  52  (correct),  53,  54,  53  (false),  of  the  Advancement  of 
Learning,  1640,  when  we  discover  most  of  them  were  patrons  of 
poets.  For  example,  the  first  illustration  is  of  Doraitian  (page  52, 
false).  Domitian,  although  a  had  man,  gave  great  honors  and  gifts 
to  the  Poet  Eustathius,  who  wrote  a  history  from  >^neas  to 
Anastasius,  the  emperor.  At  a  solemn  feast,  he  caused  him  to  sit  at 
his  table,  crowned  with  a  garland  of  laurels.  Antoninus  Pius,  whom 
Bacon  quotes  upon  page  51,  we  find  (according  to  Suetonius)  giving 
Appian  so  many  ducats  of  gold,  as  there  were  number  of  verses  in  a 
great  work,  which  he  had  written  concerning  nature  and  fishes. 
Bacon  writes  of  this  emperor,  *^  Antoninus,  as  by  name,  so  native,  a 
man  exceeding  pious,  for  his  nature  and  inbred  goodness  was  be- 
loved and  most  acceptable  to  men  of  all  sorts  and  degrees  "  (p.  51). 
Of  Nerva  Bacon  writes:  "  Nerva  was  a  learned  prince,  an  inward 
acquaintance,  and  even  a  disciple  to  ApoUonius,  the  Pythagorean, 
who  also  almost  expired  in  a  verse  of  Homer's: 

"  '  Telis  Phoebe  tuis,  lachrimas  ulciscere  nostras.'  "  (p.  52.) 
Bacon  could  not  allude  directly  to  Shakespeare,  but,  by  analogy, 
he  introduces  upon  this  page  (bearing  a  frame  portrait  of  Shakes- 
peare, 1616,  aged  52)  Shakespeare's  greatest  prototype.  Homer. 

But  it  is  Alexander  the  Great  Bacon  dwells  on  the  most  —  that 
is  for  four  pages —  (52,  53,  54  and  half  of  53)  —  and  I  do  not  think 
the  reason  Bacon  so  dwells  upon  him  and  finally  compares  him  to 
himself  is  far  to  seek — that  is,  Alexander's  love  of  Homer.  And 
mark  the  following  passage  is  upon  page  52  (Shakespeare's  com- 
pleted age  1616),  and  in  the  margin  against  the  passage  are  the 
words  ut  supra,  which  are  repeated  page  53  (false). 

''  Alexander  was  bred  and  taught  under  Aristotle  (certainly  a 
great  philosopher),  who  dedicated  divers  of  his  books  of  philosophy 
unto  him.  What  price  and  estimation  he  had  learning  in  doth  nota- 
bly appear  in  many  particulars,  as  in  the  envy  he  expressed  towards 
Achilles'  great  fortune  in  this,  that  he  had  so  good  a  trumpet  of  his 
actions  and  prowess  as  Homer's  Verses.  In  the  judgment  he  gave 
touching  the  precious  cabinet  of  Darius,  which  was  found  amongst 
the  rest  of  the  spoils ;  whereof,  when  question  was  moved,  what  thing 
was  worthy  to  be  put  into  it,  and  one  said  one  thing,  and  another, 
another,  he  gave  sentence  for  Homer's  Works. '^  (p.  52,  correct.) 

Upon  page  53  (correct)  it  may  be  seen  Bacon  once  more  intro- 
duces Homer  in  context  with  Alexander, 

"  In  poesy,  let  that  speech  be  observed,  when,  upon  the  bleeding 
\.        of  his  wounds,  he  called  unto  him  one  of  his  flatterers,  that  was 


52  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

wont  to  ascribe  unto  him  divine  honor.  '  Look  (saith  he),  this  is 
the  blood  of  a  man,  not  such  liquor  as  Homer  speaks  of,  tvhich  ran  from 
Venus^  hand  when  it  was  pierced  hy  Diomedes,'  with  this  speech 
checking  both  the  poets.  ^' 

Nor  does  Bacon  end  his  admiration  for  Homer  here,  but  by  a 
most  profound  and  subtle  analogy  introduces  him  again  upon  pages 
62  and  63,  in  context  with  the  subject  of  Renovation  through 
Time  and  the  immortality  of  learning,  which  he  compares  to  a  shipi 
—  thus  touching  this  very  work  itself,  whichhe  presents  as  a  ship  sail- 
ing through  time.  In  1623,  when  the  first  collected  edition  of  the  folio 
Shakespeare  plays  were  published,  and  also  when  this  actual  work 
in  Latin  (the  De  Augmentis)  was  also  published  side  by  side  tvith  it, 
Francis  Bacon  was  62  years  old  and  in  his  63rd  year.  There  can  be 
no  question  about  that  fact,  for  his  monument,  erected  by  his  faith- 
ful friend.  Sir  Thomas  Meavtys,  states  he  died  in  1626,  at  the  age 
of  6G ;  that  is,  he  was  in  his  66th  year  —  had  lived  65  years  and  a 
fraction  of  a  year.  Now,  if  Bacon  alludes  to  Homer  upon  pages 
carrying  Shakespeare's  two  ages  (as  a  portrait  in  the  frame  paging), 
viz.,  52  and  53  (see  Stratford  menument),  is  it  not  remarkable  to 
find  Bacon  again  introducing  Homer  upon  pages  bearing  his  own 
age  in  1623,  when  the  folio  plays  and  Be  Augmentis  went  forth  to- 
gether ?  Bacon  tells  us  in  an  entire  book  (VI th)  '^  Analogy  is  one  of 
his  great  methods  of  transmission  of  secret  knowledge. "  I  don't  know 
any  profounder  possible  hint  than  Homer's  works  for  Shakespeare's, 
seeing  the  former  is  the  crown  and  representative  poet  of  the  ancient 
world,  as  the  latter  is  of  the  modern.  Bacon  gives  us  in  his 
preface  to  the  Instauration  just  the  sort  of  hint  as  to  ciphers  by 
means  of  mathematics,  or  portraits  in  the  frame  paging,  viz.,  in  the 
blank  margin  of  the  letter  press,  we  require.  "  For  it  came  into  our 
minds,  that  in  mathematics,  the  frame  standing,  the  demonstration 
is  facile  and  perspicuous.  '^ 

Now,  mark  upon  page  62  Bacon  writes  the  following : 

"  It  is  an  ancient  observation  that  Homer  hath  given  more  men 
their  living  than  either  Sylla  or  Caesar  or  Augustus  ever  did.'' 
Upon  page  63:  "  But  we  see  how  far  the  monuments  of  wit  and 
learning  are  more  durable  than  the  monuments  of  material  me- 
morials and  manufactures.    Have  not  the  verses  of  Homer  continued 

1  "For  there  are  found  in  the  Intellectual  Glohe  as  in  the  Terrestrial,  soils  im- 

S roved  and  deserts."  (P.  22,  Distribution  Preface,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 
in  the  title  page  engraving  of  this  work  may  be  seen  this  Mtindus  Intellectualis, 
faintly  dotted  out  and  suggesting  the  neio  world.,  in  opposition  to  the  old  tcorld 
which  is  presented  by  a  globe  on  the  other  side.  Bacon's  ship  is  sailing  for  the 
former,  and  may  be  seen  below  passing  what  Bacon  calls  the  "  latal  columns." 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  53 

twenty-five  centuries  of  years  and  above  tvithout  the  loss  of  a  syllable 
or  letter  f  During  which  time  infinite  number  of  places,  temples,  cas- 
tles, cities,  have  been  decayed  or  been  demolished.  The  images  of 
men^s  wits  remain  unmaimed  in  books  forever,  exempt  from  the 

injuries  of  time,  because  capable  of  perpetual  renovations how 

much  more  are  letters  to  be  magnified,  which,  as  ships  passing 
through  the  vast  sea  of  time,  connect  the  remotest  ages  of  wits  and 
inventions  in  mutual  trafiic  and  correspondency.''^ 

I  do  not  myself  question  the  hint  Bacon  is  giving  us  in  context 
with  the  metaphor  of  the  ship.  For  this  work  itself  he  compares  to 
a  ship,  and  the  title  page  engraving  carries  the  emblem  of  a  ship 
sailing  through  the  columns  of  Hercules  in  search  of  a  new  ivorld 
of  sciences;  that  is,  Bacon's  Deficients,  which  he  calls  by  this  name, 
are  part  of  the  new  world,  hemisphere,  or  intellectual  globe  of  the 
theater  which  can  only  be  reached  by  means  of  this  key  book,  "  for 
the  better  opening  up  of  the  Instauration.'^ 

Alexander  was  scholar  to  Aristotle  five  years  together,  and  the 
learning  of  Aristotle,  under  whom  Alexander  was  tutored,  took 
such  root  and  efiBcacy  in  the  scholar,  that  he  became  so  excellent  a 
king  as  no  one  in  the  world  was  able  to  compare  with  him.  Being 
in  the  midst  of  his  armies,  he  would  not  give  over  study,  but  ever- 
more laid  (with  his  sword)  on  the  pillow  of  his  bed  the  Iliad  of 
Homer  and  other  books ;  and  it  appeared  that  such  was  his  love  to 
learning,  that  he  could  as  easily  apprehend  it  as  he  conquered  king- 
doms by  force  of  arms.  Plutarch,  Aulus  Gellius  and  Themistocles 
do  affirm,  that  Alexander  had  published  certain  books  of  natural 
philosophy,  whereof  he  had  been  an  auditor  under  Aristotle,  in 
regard  whereof  he  wrote  a  letter  unto  him. 

The  letter  of  the  great  Alexander  to  his  master,  Aristotle : 

"  Truly,  Aristotle,  thou  hast  done  ill  in  publishing  those  books 
of  speculative  philosophy,  by  thee  composed.  For,  in  thine  own 
judgment,  wherein  can  I  possibly  excel  other  men  when  the  science 
wherein  thou  hast  instructed  me  cometh  to  be  common  to  all  men  f  I 
would  have  thee  to  know  that  I  more  covet  to  precede  all  men  in  learn- 
ing and  knowledge  than  in  riches,  pomp,  power  or  dominion.  Fare- 
well.'^ 

"  When  this  was  understood  by  Aristotle,  to  comfort  and  please  so 
puissant  a  prince,  he  commanded  that  his  books  (formerly  common) 
should  be  so  obscured  that  it  was  not  possible  to  under- 
stand THEM,  BUT  BY  HIS  OWN  INTERPRETATION. "  ^ 

1  Treasury  of  Ancient  and  Modern  Times,  translated  out  of  the  Spanish  by 
Pedro  Mexia  and  Francisco  Sansovino.  Jaggard,  London,  1613,  1619. 


5i  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE, 

Now,  I  maintain  Bacon's  reference  to  Alexander  upon  tMs  false 
page  53  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning,  of  1640,  in  context  with 
himself  and  his  own  name,  Francis  Bacon,  in  the  margin,  is  ex- 
pressly made  with  reference  to  this  passage  placed  by  us  in  capitals 
viz.,  "  That  his  hooks  should  he  so  obscured,  that  it  was  not  pos- 
sible TO  understand  them,  but  by  his  OWN  INTERPRETA- 
TION." The  words  "  ut  supra,^'  over  Francis  Bacon,  point  to  the 
false  paging,  53,  to  indicate,  hi/  the  portrait  in  the  frame  paging, 
Shakespeare  (who  died  in  his  53d  year,  1616) ;  that  is  to  say,  Bacon 
compares  himself  and  Shakespeare  to  Alexander  and  Aristotle. 
Upon  page  52  Bacon  writes  of  Alexander.  "  His  reprehensory  letter 
to  Aristotle,  after  he  had  set  forth  his  Book  of  Nature  [Lihrum 
Naturce)  wherein  he  expostulates  with  \mn.  for  publishing  the  secrets 
or  mysteries  of  philosophy,  and  gave  him  to  understand,  that  himself 
esteemed  it  more  to  excel  others  in  learning  and  knowledge  than  in 
power  and  empire.-^    (p.  52,  his,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640. )i 

It  cannot  bo  questioned  Bacon  is  referring  to  just  those  works  of 
Alexander  which  the  latter  intended  should  not  be  published  so  as 
to  be  understood.  I  am  convinced  Bacon  has  selected  Alexander's 
example  as  typical  of  his  own  method  of  obscuration  and  conceal- 
ment, Bacon  likewise  intending  to  furnish  in  this  Be  Augmentis  his 
own  key  and  interpretation.  We  may  perceive  in  the  Preface  to  his 
Instauration,  he  obscurely  compares  himself  to  Alexander,  as  a  Cap- 
tain, coming  (in  this  very  work? )  to  take  possession  of  his  own  — 
"  For  we  come  not  hither  as  augurs,  to  measure  countries  in  our 
mind,  for  divination,  but  as  Captains  2  to  invade  them  eor  a 
CONQUEST. "  (P.  23,  Distribution  Preface,  Advancement  of  Lear- 
ning, 1640.) 

It  may  be  seen  from  the  letter  to  Aristotle  I  quote,  that  Alexander 
was  concealing  his  own  authorship  under  the  name  of  Aristotle.  Though 
Alexander  attributes  the  work  to  Aristotle, —  ^^  by  thee  composed.''^ 
nevertheless,  it  is  plain  he  is  blaming  Aristotle  on  his  (Alexander's) 
own  account,  because  he  is  desirous  of  remaining  unknown.  Plu- 
tarch, Aulus  Gellius,  and  Themistocles,  assert  what  is  evident  on  the 
face  of  the  letter,  that  Alexander  was  the  real  author  of  this  work. 

1  "Alexander  the  Great  was  an  initiate.  The  Jewish  High  Priest  in  Jerusalem 
received  Alexander  the  Great  into  the  Temple,  and  led  him  into  the  Holy  of  Holies 
to  offer  sacrifice." — The  Tarot  (p.  6)  Pajous. 

2  'Tor  Alexander's  expedition  into  Asia  was  prejudged  as  a  vast  and  impossible 
enterprise;  yet,  afterwards  it  pleased  Livy,  so  to  to  slight  it  as  to  say  of  Alexander, 
'■Nilalind  quam  bene  ausus  est  vana  contemnere.  The  same  thing  happened  unto  Colum- 
bus in  the  western  navigation.^  "    (P.  36,  Advancement  of  Learning  ^  1640.) 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  55 

( Vide  Plutarch,  in  vita  Alex.  Aul.  Gellius  in  lib.  xv.  cap.  3  -,  Themls- 
toclesin  Alex.) 

If  the  reader  will  carefully  study  the  first  paragraph  of  page  53 
(false  for  55)  he  will  perceive  a  seeming  contradiction  or  paradox, 
inasmuch  as  Bacon  represents  Henry,  Duke  of  Guise,  to  himself,  "  not 
as  Alexander  the  Great,  hut  as  Aristotle^ s  scholar. "  But  Alexander 
was  Aristotle's  scholar,  as  Bacon  himself  states  upon  page  52 :  "  Alex- 
ander was  bred  and  taught  under  Aristotle. "  Bacon  is  plainly  draw- 
ing a  profound  and  subtle  distinction  between  Alexander  the  Great 
and  Aristotle's  scholar  for  some  purpose,  though  both  are  identical. 
And  this  hint  in  connection  with  the  Duke  of  Guise,  ''  whose  tvealth 
consisted  only  in  names  .^  "  I  think  the  profound  thinker  will 
recognize  Bacon's  intention  is  to  refer  to  Alexander  as  the  scholar  of 
Aristotle,  who  refused  to  attach  his  name  to  a  work  of  his  own,  and, 
therefore,  he  lays  stress  upon  their  literary  relationship,  whicli 
relationship  is  compared  to  the  Duke  of  Guise,  who  put  all  his  credit 
out  in  obligations,  in  the  hope  of  a  future  throne.  And  this  was 
Bacon's  position  with  regard  to  the  plays  known  as  Shakespeare's. 
He  was,  de  facto,  the  heir  and  king,  hut  not  in  name. 

Plutarch  writes  of  Aristotle : 

*'  Alexander  gained  from  him  not  only  moral  and  political  knowl- 
edge, but  was  also  instructed  in  those  more  secret  and  profound 
branches  of  science,  which  they  call  acroamatic  and  epoptic,  and 
which  they  did  not  communicate  to  every  common  scholar;!  for 
when  Alexander  was  in  Asia,  and  received  information  that  Aris- 
totle had  published  some  books  in  which  those  points  were  dis- 
cussed, he  wrote  him  a  letter  in  behalf  of  philosophy,  in  which  he 
blamed  the  course  he  had  taken.    The  following  is  a  copy  of  it: 

"  '  Alexander  to  Aristotle,  prosperity.  You  did  wrong  in  pub- 
lishing the  acroamatic  parts  of  science.2  In  what  shall  we  difler 
from  others,  if  the  sublimer  knowledge  which  we  gained  from  you 
be  made  common  to  all  the  world?  For  my  part,  I  had  rather  excel 
the  bulk  of  mankind  in  the  superior  parts  of  learning,  than  in  the 
extent  of  power  and  dominion.    Farewell.' 

"  Aristotle,  in  compliment  to  this  ambition  of  his,  and  by  way  of 
excuse  for  himself,  made  answer,  thaf  those  points  were  published 
and  not  puhlished.  In  fact  his  book  of  metaphysics  is  written  in 
such  a  manner  that  no  one  can  learn  that  branch  of  science  from  it, 
much  less  teach  it  others ;  it  serves  only  to  refresh  the  memories 
of  those  who  have  been  taught  by  a  master. 

''■  It  appears  also,  to  me,  that  it  was  by  Aristotle,  rather  than  any 
other  person,  that  Alexander  was  assisted  in  the  study  of  physic,  for 
he  not  only  loved  the  theory,  but  the  practice  too,  as  is  clear  from 

1  The  scholars  in  general  were  instructed  only  in  the  exoteric  doctrines.  Aul. 
Gell.  lib.  XX.  cap.  5. 

2  Doctrines  taught  by  private  comiiiuiiication,  and  delivered  viva  voce. 


56  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

his  epistles,  wliere  we  find  that  he  prescribed  to  his  friends  medi- 
cines and  a  proper  regimen. 

"  He  loved  polite  learning  too,  and  his  natural  thirst  of  knowl- 
edge made  him  a  man  of  extensive  reading.  The  Iliad,  he  thought, 
as  well  as  called,  a  portable  treasure  of  military  knowledge  ;  and  he 
had  a  copy  corrected  hy  Aristotle,  ivhich  is  called  the  casket  copy.'^ 
Onesicritus  informs  us  that  he  used  to  lay  it  under  his  pillow  with 
his  sword.  As  he  could  not  find  many  other  books  in  the  upper 
provinces  of  Asia,  he  wrote  to  Harpakis  for  a  supply,  who  sent  liim 
the  works  of  Philistus,  most  of  the  tragedies  of  Euripides,  Sophocles, 
and  ^schylus,  and  the  Dithyrambics  of  Telestus  and  Philoxenus. 

"  A  casket  being  one  day  brought  him,  which  appeared  one  of 
the  most  curious  and  valuable  things  among  the  treasures  and  the 
whole  equipage  of  Darius,  he  asked  his  friends  what  they  thought 
most  worthy  to  be  put  in  it?  Different  things  were  to  be  proposed, 
but  he  said,  '  The  Iliad  most  deserved  such  a  case.'  This  particular 
is  mentioned  by  several  writers  of  credit.  And  if  what  the  Alexan- 
drians say,  upon  the  faith  of  Heraclides,  be  true,  Homer  was  no  bad 
auxiliary,  or  useless  counselor,  in  the  course  of  the  war. " — [PlutarcNs 
Lives:  Alexander.    Langhorne;  pp.  123,  107,  vol.  II.) 

If  the  student  will  turn  to  the  sixth  book  of  Bacon's  De  Aug- 
mentis  (or  its  translation  by  Wats,  1640),  he  will  find  Bacon,  in 
Chapter  II.,  describing  the  Wisdom  of  Delivery  and  Traditive 
Knowledge,  with  their  different  methods,  as  Magistral  or  Initiative 
(which  he  terms  the  Delivery  of  the  Lamp),  Exotericall  or  revealed 
— ACEOAMATicAL,  OR  THE  co:ncealed  METHOD,  with  many  oth- 
ers.    Of  the  latter  he  writes : 

"  For  the  same  difference  the  Ancients  specially  observed,  in 
publishing  books,  the  same  we  will  transfer  to  the  manner  itself  of 
DELIVERY.  So  the  Acroamatic  method  was  in  use  with  the  writers 
of  former  ages,  and  wisely  and  with  judgment  applied,  but  that 
Acroamatic  and  Enigmatical  kind  of  expression  is  disgraced  in 
these  later  times  by  many,  who  have  made  it  as  a  dubious  and  false 
light  for  the  vent  of  their  counterfeit  merchandise.  But  the  pre- 
tence thereof  seemeth  to  be  this,  that  by  the  intricate  enveloping  of 
Delivery  the  profane  Vulgar  may  be  removed  from  the  secrets  of 
sciences,  and  they  only  admitted  which  had  either  acquired  the 
interpretation  of  parables  by  tradition  from  their  teachers  or,  by  the 
sharpness  and  subtlety  of  their  own  wit,  could  r»ierce  the  veil. " 
(P.  273-274,  Lib.  YI.,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.. 

There  can  be  no  question  this  work  itself  is  written  in  just  such 
an  Acroamatic  style  as  Bacon  describes.     Bacon,  in  a  letter  to  Doc- 

1  He  kept  it  in  a  rich  casket  found  among  the  spoils  of  Darius.  A  correct 
copy  of  this  edition,  revised  by  Aristotle,  Callisthenes  and  Anaxarchus,  was  pub- 
lished after  the  death  of  Alexander.  "  Darius,"  said  Alexander,  "  used  to  keep  his 
ointments  in  this  casket;  but  I,  who  have  no  time  to  anoint  myself,  will  convert 
it  to  a  nobler  use.'* 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  57 

tor  Playfer,  refers  to  his  Be  Augmcntis  as  "  flying  too  high  above 
men's  heads, "  on  account  of  the  "  ohscurity  of  the  stt/le,  which  must 
select  its  reader. " 

All  these  pages  are  italicized  with  a  direct  cipher  purport.  ^  Let 
the  reader  count  the  italic  words  upon  the  second  false  page  (53), 
where  he  sees  Fra.  Bacon's  name  placed  in  the  margin,  with  the 
words  ut  supra,  referring  evidently  to  Shakespeare^ s  portrait  in  the 
frame  paging,  viz.,  his  age  53,  when  he  died,  1616.  The  Stratford 
monument  says  ^^  obiit  cetatis  53.''^  Bacon  was  55  in  1616,  and  in 
his  56th  year.  This  page  53  is  false  for  55,  the  correct  number.  So 
that,  if  this  cipher  speaks,  it  declares  plainly  "  Francis  Bacon"  ap- 
plies the  parallel  of  the  Duke  of  Guise  (as  having  pawned  his  inher- 
itance) to  himself  in  his  relationship  to  Shakespeare,  indicated  by 
53.  Directly  we  count  these  italic  words  from  the  top  of  the  page 
we  find: 

all        34,  105  all  counted. 

Ms        35,  106  ''         " 

wealth  36, 107  ''         " 

Is  it  not  striking  to  find  the  play  numbers  35,  36  against  "  his 
wealth  f  "  Upon  pages  106,  107  of  this  same  work,  dramatic  poesy 
and  stage  plays  are  introduced  for  the  first  and  last  time.  More- 
over, the  word  "  Bacon  "  is  upon  page  53,  column  106,  of  The  Merry 
Wives  of  Windsor,  and  "  Francis ''  (Bacon's  Christian  name)  twenty- 
one  times  upon  column  107  of  the  Histories  (p.  56,  false  for  54) ,  1st  King 
Henry  IV.  Bacon  indicates  himself  the  heir  and  successor  to  the 
literary  throne  held  by  the  false  Shakespeare  (53),  Bacon  being 
the  true  55  usurped  by  the  false  53,  both  being  frame  portraits 
of  Shakespeare  and  Bacon  in  1616.  The  Duke  of  Guise  was, 
de  facto,  King  of  France;  he  compared  himself  to  the  greatest 
usurer  in  all  France';  that  is,  he  had  given  away  all  his  present 
interests  for  the  sake  of  their  return  in  his  inheritance  and 
lawful  succession  to  the  throne,  i  Henry,  the  reigning  king, 
was  a  roi  faineant  —  a  mere  puppet,  and  in  this  parallel  we 
may  guess  Bacon's  profound  simile  as  applied  to  Shakespeare  and 
himself,  viz.,  that  Bacon  held  the  rightful  claim  to  the  succession  of 
literary  authorship",  and  had  pawned  it,  or  laid  it  out  to  interest, 

1  In  a  letter  to  the  Earl  of  Devonshire,  touching  Essex,  Bacon  writes :  ' '  My 
answer,  I  remember,  was,  that  for  my  fortune  it  was  no  great  matter ;  but  that  his 
Lordship's  offer  made  me  call  to  mind  what  was  wont  to  be  said  when  I  was  in 
France  of  the  Duke  of  Guise,  that  he  was  the  greatest  usurer  in  France,  because  he 
had  turned  all  his  estate  into  obligations  ;  meaning  that  he  had  left  himself  nothing, 
but  only  had  bound  numbers  of  persons  to  him." 


58  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

that  tlie  capital  might  return  to  him  tenfold.  No  subtler  parallel 
can  be  imagined.  For  a  usurer  parts  with  his  money  conditionally 
only  J — it  is  lent  for  awhile,  given  for  use  during  a  term,  but  always 
with  the  reversionary  right  of  returning  to  its  laivful  oivner  again. 
Bacon's  literary  wealth  was  thus  laid  out  in  others''  names,  who  were 
bound  to  him  for  the  obligation.  By  introducing  Alexander  the 
Great,  in  connection  with  the  Duke  of  Guise,  Bacon  points  out  the 
literary  parallel  we  adduce  as  to  the  publication,  under  Aristotle^ s 
name,  of  a  tvork  by  that  great  scholar.  A  usurer's  wealth  is  parted  with 
for  the  sake  of  the  obligations  which  the  parties  borrowing  it  lay 
themselves  under.  They  sign  their  names  to  bills,  and  these 
signatures  or  names  are  really  the  potential  wealth  of  the 
lender.  Bacon  pawned  or  lent  his  name  or  wealth  to  Shake- 
speare, and  this  work  is  the  key  by  which  he  intended  to  repay 
himself.  He  refers  to  this  by  the  marginal  text  of 
his  own  name  standing  against  the  passage  we  allude  to,  and 
points  as  it  were  with  the  Latin  "  ut  supra  "  to  the  portrait  in  the 
frame  of  Shakespeare,  aged  53,  1616,  masking  the  correct  paging  55 
(Bacon's  full  years  also,  1616),  as  much  as  to  say,  by  figures,  '*  all 
this  refers  to  myself  in  relationship  to  Shakespeare,  as  you  may  see 
by  my  mispaging  ;  I  am  the  true  55  of  1616,  who  has  paivned  his 
literary  right  to  the  false  53. "  I  consider  this  page  53  [bis]  the  most 
important  in  this  work.  The  reader  may  see,  by  Bacon's  introduction 
of  his  Analogy  or  Grammatical  Philosophy,  he  is  giving  us  a 
hint  for  just  the  sort  of  analogy,  by  means  of  Notes  of  Things,  which 
he  discusses  under  the  head  of  Traditive  Knowledge  or  the  Art  of 
Delivering  the  Things  Invented,  in  the  sixth  book,  page  259.  Upon 
page  252,  under  the  thirty-fourth  star,  he  thus  explains  DeAnalogia 
Bemonstrationum,  or,  Proofs  from  Analogy  : 

"  There  remains  one  part  of  judgment  of  great  excellency,  which 
likewise  we  set  down  as  deficient.  The  subject  of  this  point  is  this, 
the  different  kind  of  demonstrations  and  proofs,  to  different  kind  of 
matter  and  subjects;  so  that  this  doctrine  containeth  the  indication  of 
indications.  For  Aristotle  adviseth  well,  that  we  may  not  require 
demonstrations  from  orators,  or  persuasions  from  mathematicians.^'' 
(P.  252.) 

The  reader  will  observe,  then,  that  analogy  is  one  of  Bacon's 
systems  of  judgment  and  proof  by  means  of  mathematics.  Upon  the 
same  page,  53,  to  which  we  allude,  he  writes, ''  De^m^/o^/m,  which  was 
nothing  else  but  a  grammatical  philosophy, "  alluding  to  Csesar's 
book  upon  analogy.  Upon  page  261  Bacon  writes :  '^  We  have  con- 
ceived and  comprehended  in  our  mind  a  kind  of  grammar,  which 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUUE.  59 

may  diligently  inquire  not  the  analogy  of  words  with  another,  hut  the 
analogy  between  words  and  things  or  reason. "  (P.  261.)  We  do  not 
require  persuasions  from  mathematicians,  l)ut  proofs  which  we  find 
out  for  ourselves.  Bacon  is  hinting  that  his  analogy  is  above  per- 
suasion and  must  carry  its  own  proof  by  investigation.  The  fact 
that  these  observations  can  all  be  referred  to  page  53  (from  Bacon's 
hint  for  his  own  grammatical  philosophy  upou  that  page)  is  a  proof 
that  the  mathematical  analogy  I  have  already  adduced  in  regard  to 
the  portrait  in  the  frame  of  the  text  embracing  these  hints  is  true. 
Bacon  does  not  refer  us  upon  page  53  to  his  own  system  of  analogy 
and  grammatical  philosophy  (star  36)  directly,  but  by  analogy  only. 
The  three  deficients  of  a  new  world  of  sciences,  entitled,  respect- 
ively, De  Analogia  Bemonstrationum,  Be  Notis  Berum  and  Gram- 
matica  Philosophans,  are  the  thirty-fourth,  thirty-fifth,  thirty-sixth 
(stars  or  asterisks)  in  order  of  the  catalogue  at  the  end  of  the  work, 
and  thus  correspond  with  the  italic  words  '^  all  his  zvealth/'  already 
quoted,  page  53,  as  also  with  the  words  Hing,  Hang,  Hog,  page  53, 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  which  are  also  the  thirty-fourth,  thirty- 
fifth,  thirty-sixth  words  in  italics  down  that  page. 

'*  Hang-Hog  is  Latin  for  Bacon,  I  warrant  you. " 
263  264  265  266  267  268  269  270  271 
Upon  page  53  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor  we  find  a  grammatical 
scene  in  which  the  demonstrative  pronoun,  hie,  hcec,  hoc,  or  noun 
standing  in  the  place  of  a  proper  name,  is  declined,  and  mark  identi- 
fied in  the  accusative  case  with  Bacon,  as  pointing  to  that  partic- 
ular person  or  thing.  A  demonstrative  pronoun  is  a  noun  which 
distinguishes  or  points  out  somebody  as  a  proper  name — Rex  the 
King,  CsBsar,  or,  as  we  postulate.  Bacon  as  a  proper  name.  It  is 
the  accusative  case  which  lays  accent  and  stress  on  the  particular 
thing  or  individual  named.  If  this  word  Bacon  can  be  proved  to  be 
the  surname  of  Francis  Bacon,  by  analogy  or  proofs  mathematic, 
then,  indeed,  this  actual  scene  harmonizes  with  Bacon's  definition  of 
a  grammatical  philosophy  which  shall  inquire  into  the  analogy  be- 
tween words  and  things.  It  is  the  accusative  case,  hinc,  hanc,  hoc, 
which  is  identified  by  travesty  or  mispronunciation  of  the  words, 

"  Hang  Hog  is  Latin  for  Bacon,  I  warrant  you  " 
— with  Bacon,  in  order  to  identify  the  36th  Apophthegm  of  the  collec- 
tion by  Bacon  in  the  1671  Besuscitatio  by  means  of  cipher  con- 
gruity  with  this  line. 

In  Bacon's  essay  Of  Unity  in  Beligion,  he  writes  : 

"  The  quarrels  and  divisions  about  religion  were  evils  unknown  to 


60  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

the  heathen.  The  reason  was  because  the  religion  of  the  heathen 
consisted  rather  in  rites  and  ceremonies  than  in  any  constant  behef. 
For  you  may  imagine  what  kind  of  faith  theirs  was,  wJien  the  chief 
doctors  and  fathers  of  their  church  zvere  the  poets, ''  (1625,  British 
Museum  copy.) 

Now,  remark  how  Bacon,  in  his  Be  Augmentis,  lets  the  '^  cat  out 
of  the  bag, "  and  gives  us  a  hint  for  the  hand  that  introduced 
Jupiter  in  Cymbeline,  and  Ceres  in  The  Tempest,  Theseus  (one  of  the 
founders  of  the  Mysteries)  in  the  Midsummer  NighVs  Dream,  and  the 
endless  classical  parallels,  with  names  such  as  Camillo,  Autolycus, 
Hermia,  Demetrius,  Lysander,  Helena,  Hermione,  all  of  which  are 
more  or  less  allied  to  the  Mysteries. 

"  But,  to  speak  the  truth,  the  best  doctors  of  this  knowledge  are  the 
poets,  and  writers  of  histories,  where  we  may  find  painted  and  dis- 
sected to  the  life,  how  affections  are  to  he  stirred  up  and  kindled,  how 
stilled  and  laid  asleep,  how  again  contained  and  refrained,  that  they 
break  forth  not  into  act?  Likewise  how  they  disclose  themselves 
though  repressed  and  secreted'?  What  operations  they  produce? 
What  turns  they  take  ?  How  they  are  enwrapped  one  with  the  other  ? 
How  they  fight  and  encounter  one  with  another  ?  ''  (P.  355,  book  vii., 
Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 

Each  of  these  sentences  concludes  ivith  a  note  of  interrogation, 
although  the  propositions  are  not  framed  in  an  interrogative  way. 
And  this  is  curious,  because  we  may  indeed  ask  with  Bacon,  who 

ARE  THE  PAHTICULAE  DOCTOES  AND  POETS  HE  ALLFDES  OR 

POINTS  at  ?  It  is  indeed  plain  all  he  suggests  can  only  be  found  in 
action,  that  is,  in  the  x>lay  of  character  against  character,  as  in  the 
drama,  and  not  in  epic  or  lyric  poetry  at  all !  We  may  ask  in  vain  for 
any  art,  save  that  called  Shakespeare^ s,  answering  to  this  description! 
Inasmuch  as  we  quote  from  a  supposed  translation  of  Bacon's 
De  Augmentis,  I  give  here  the  Latin  text  of  the  Be  Augmentis  itself, 
1623,  where  the  same  anomaly  between  the  notes  of  interrogation 
and  the  framing  of  the  sentences  may  be  observed.  Bacon  writes 
with  a  magistral  air  of  reference  to  these  doctors  and  poets,  yet  asks 
a  question  as  to  whom  he  is  referring ! 

*'  Sed  si  verum  omnino  dicendum  sit,  Doctores  hujus  scientice 
prsecipui  sunt  PostcB  et  Historici ;  in  quibus  ad  vivum  depiugi  et 
dissecari  solet,  quomodo  affectus  excitandi  sunt  et  accendendif 
Quomodo  leniendi  et  sopiendi  ?  Quomodo  rursus  continendi  ac  re- 
frffiuandi,  ne  in  Actus  erumpant  ?  Quomodo  itidem  sc,  licet  compress! 
occultati,  prodant?  Quas  Operationes  edant?  Quas  Vices  subeant? 
Qnalitor  sibi  mutuo  implicentur?  Qualiter  inter  se  digladientur  et 
opponautur?  Et  innumera  hujus  generis.  Inter  qua?  hoc  ultimum 
plumiri  est  usus,  in  Moralibus  et  Civilibus ;    Qualtiter    (inquam) 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  61 

affectus  affectum  in  ordinem  cogat ;  et  alter ius  auxilio,  ad  alt^rum 
subjugandum,  uti  liceat  f  "  (Page  371,  liber  septimus  Be  Augmentis 
1623.) 

The  italic  words  are  as  in  the  original.  Likewise  the  notes  of 
interrogation  concluding  each  sentence.  Does  the  Latin  support 
this  curious,  suggestive  query?  I  think  not.  And  here,  let  it  be 
remarked,  the  word  "  Bacon  "  is  the  37lst  word  upon  page  53, 
First  King  Henry  IV.,  as  Mr.  Donnelly  pointed  out  in  The  Great 
Cryptogram.  Mark,  the  passage  we  cite  is  upon  pages  370,  371, 
Be  Augmentis,  1623.  Yet  there  are  literary  men  who  declare 
Bacon's  mind  was  totally  opposed  to  poetry!  Here  is  proof  that 
the  Great  Father  of  the  Inductive  Method  considered  Poetry  the 
best  Boctor  to  inculcate  Ethic  or  Morality! ! ! 

The  reader  will  notice  the  contradiction  of  Bacon's  two  passages 
cited,  showing  the  heathen  poets  were  close  at  his  heart,  and 
accounting  at  once  for  the  profound  classical  character  of  the  1623 
theatre.  I  unhesitatingly  assert  the  plays  called  Shakespeare's  are 
saturated  to  an  extraordinary  depth  {not  capable  of  adequate  expres- 
sion by  words)  in  the  spirit  of  classical  learning,  and  contain  mar- 
velous, recondite  scholarship!  The  author  could  have  instructed 
^Eschylus  or  Sophocles  upon  their  own  art  and  its  source  in  the 
Mysteries.  The  fact  that  scholars  like  Mr.  Gladstone  do  not 
recognize  all  this  is  extraordinary.  It  is  nothing  short  of 
an  entire  restoration  of  heathen  religion  !  i  And  where 
do  we  find  an  echo  to  all  this  in  Bacon's  writings?  I  reply, 
in  his  collection  entitled  The  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients,  where 
the  central  fables  of  the  Mysteries  and  Poets  may  be  found  as 
examples  of  Philosophy  applied  to  Parabolical  Poetry!  Is  it  not 
pretty  plain  Bacon  was  studying  the  origin  of  the  classical  drama, 
when  he  gives  us  a  dissertation  twice  upon  its  chief  figure,  Bacchus 
or  Dionysus;  and  another  upon  Proserpine;  another  upon  Prome- 
theus ;  and  others  upon  Styx,  Achelous,  Memnon,  Tithonus,  and 
Orpheus,  who  is  the  reputed  founder  of  the  Mysteries  f  No  wonder 
Ben  Jonson  declared  that  he  had  done  more  than  insolent  Greece 
or  all  haughty  Eome  had  performed.  And  this  is  what,  I  take  it, 
he  means  by  the  Restoration  of  Knowledge,  which  he  proposes  as 

1  "For  we  are  carried,  in  some  degree,  with  an  equal  temper  ef  desire,  both  to 
improve  the  labours  of  tlie  Ancients  and  to  make  further  progress."  (p.  22,  Distribu- 
tion Preface,  Advancement  of  Ijearning,  1640. ) 

"  Surely  the  advice  of  the  Prophet  is  the  true  direction  in  this  case,  state  super 
vias  antiq^ias  et  videte  qiio^iam  sit  via  recta  et  bona,  et  ambulate  inea.  Antiquity 
deserveth  that  reverence,  that  men  should  make  a  stay  awhile  and  stand  there- 
upon "    (p.  35,  Lib.  1,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640 


62  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE. 

one  o{  his  ends  in  his  Instauration  prefaces.  To  the  profound  critic 
of  modern  thought,  it  must  be  striking  to  note,  how  all  advanced 
attempts  to  solve  the  problem  of  religion,  take  a  retrograde  move- 
ment, and  seek  to  unfold  the  hermetic  gnosis  of  antiquity.  Such 
works  as  Madame  Blavatsky's  Secret  Doctrine,  and  Isis  Un- 
veiled, The  Perfect  Way,  Clothed  in  the  Sun,  by  Anna  Bonus 
Kingsford  and  Doctor  Maitland,  are  attempts  to  restore  the 
classical  gnosis  of  the  Mysteries.  They  are  going  the  road 
Bacon  and  the  Rosicrucians  anticipated,  and  have  gone  long* 
before  them !  Postel  and  his  brother,  Hermetists,  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  prophesied  all  this.  They  declared  that  the  end  of 
the  times  would  be  signaled  by  a  complete  classical  revival  of  re- 
ligious sources,  and  an  unfolding  of  the  Gnosis.  But  Postel  was 
only  a  forerunner  of  Paracelsus  and  the  Rosicrucian  revival,  or 
reconstruction  of  the  commencement  of  the  seventeenth  century, 
and  of  which  our  English  Robert  Fludd  was  at  the  head  !  The  mod- 
ern critic  may  also  notice  the  curious  Elizabethan  revival  which 
characterizes  in  many  points  this  age  in  England  and  America.  In 
architecture,  in  study  of  the  occult  sciences,  astrology,  palmistry, 
fortune  telling  by  cards,-^Theosophical  societies,  esoteric  interpre- 
tation of  scripture,  revived  interest  in  Rosicrucian  literature  and 
philosophy, — Eastern  Buddhism,  a  return  even  to  the  spirit  that  ani- 
mated the  secret  societies  of  the  Middle  Ages,  and  of  Elizabeth  and 
James  I.'s  reigns !  Christianity,  we  know  is  founded  on  something 
that  went  before  it,  and  was  not  confined  to  Judasa.  With  the  dead 
letter  we  are  no  longer  satisfied.  We  seek  the  philosophy  and 
spirit.  If  Christianty  is  true,  we  desire  to  know  why  and  how  it 
arose?  Whether  philosophically  implied  in  creation,  as  Bacon 
asserts,  or  an  introduction  afterward  ?  If,  before  creation  could  be 
manifested,  the  Lamb  of  God  was  implied  as  sacrifice  in  the  act  — 
which  is  the  Logos  doctrine  —  then  Christ  was  its  expounder.  The 
wisdom  and  love,  or  atonement  of  God  prefigured  ideally,  as  the 
reconcilement  of  man's  mind  and  heart  with  the  divine  will. 

ORPHEUS. 

"  Herodotus  declares  that  the  rites  called  Orphik  and  Bacchic 
are  in  reality  Egyptian  and  Pythagorean  (Herod,  ii.  81),  and  Diodo- 
rus  represents  Orpheus  as  introducing  the  greatest  part  of  his  mys- 
tical ceremonies  and  orgies  from  Egypt  (Diod.  i.  96).  It  is  thus  to 
be  observed  that  the  early  Orphik  and  Bacchic  rite?,  were  practically 
identical.  Orphean  and  Bacchian  orgies  expressed  quite  the  same 
thing.  .  .  .  The  worship  of  Bacchus  formed  the  central  point  of 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  63 

the  religious  brotherhood."     (K.  0.  Miiller,  Scientific  Mythol,  p.  43, 
vol.  i.,  Brown's  Great  Dionysiak  Myth,) 

Again : 

"  The  connection  in  the  Orphik  Theogony  between  Dyonisus  and 
Zeus  is  naturally  exceedingly  close."     (lb.  p.  60.) 

But  Bacchus  was  the  god  of  the  drama  and  tragedy,  and  there- 
fore it  is  not  surprising  to  find  Bacon  writing  of  Orpheus  Theatre. 
(P  .49,  Advancement  of  Learning.) 

Bacon  gives  us  again  in  his  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients  the  story 
of  Orpheus,  and  also  twice  repeats  that  of  Dionysus,  whom  he  calls 
Bacchus !  What  greater  hint  do  we  want  than  this  for  the  drama 
and  stage  plays? 

Euskin  writes: 

"  Wine,  the  Greeks,  in  their  Bacchus,  made  rightly  the  type  of 
all  passion,  which  noble  word,  including  in  its  sweep  a  wide  range 
of  ACTION  from  righteous  auger  to  holy  suffering,  leads  us  to 
Tragedy,  the  eldest  daughter  of  Dionysus,  Lord  of  the  Drama, 
herself  often  styled  the  Drama,  inasmuch  as  in  this  world's  history 
the  tragic  element  is  the  stronger  and  prevailing  one.  Tragedy, 
considered  etymologically  and  with  reference  to  its  historic  origin, 
is  a  song  accompanied  by  a  satyric  dance;  i.  e.,  one  performed  by 
persons  in  the  garb  of  satyrs,  and  these  songs  in  early  Hellas  were 
the  choric  dithyrambic  odes  in  honor  of  Dionysus;  and  so  Aristo- 
teles  tells  us  that  Tragedy  originated  in  a  rude,  unpremeditated  man- 
ner from  the  leaders  in  the  dithyrambic  hymns. "  ( ''  Unto  this  last, " 
p.  124.     Great  Dionysiak  Myth.)  vol.  i.,  p.  322.) 

Lucian,  in  his  dialogue  upon  Astrology,  says  that  Orpheus,  the 
son  of  Calliope,  ''  was  the  first  who  introduced  the  rites  of  Bacchus  into 
Greece. "  This  is  as  much  as  to  say,  the  art  of  comedy  and  tragedy, 
or  dramatic  art,  is  due  to  Orpheus.  Orpheus  is  repeatedly  referred 
to  by  Euripides,  in  whom  we  find  allusions  to  the  connection  of 
Orpheus  with  Dionysus  or  Bacchus  (Rhes.  944,  946).  He  mentions 
him  as  related  to  the  Muses,  and  connects  him  with  Bacchanalian 
orgies  in  Hippol  (953),  and  ascribes  to  him  the  origin  of  sacred  mys- 
teries (Rhes.  943),  and  places  the  scene  of  his  activity  among  the 
forests  of  Olympus  (Bacchus,  561). 

Mtiller  (in  his  Hist.  Lit.  of  Ancient  Greece,  p.  231)  writes : 

*'  The  followers  of  Orpheus  {oi  Opquxoi),  that  is  to  say,  associa- 
tions of  persons  who,  under  the  guidance  of  the  ancient  mystical 
poet,  Orpheus,  dedicated  themselves  to  the  worship  of  Bacchus.  The 
Dyonisus,  to  whose  worship  the  Orphic  and  Bacchic  rites  were  annexed 
{to.  'OpcpiHcx  HaXeojueva  xai  BanxiHcc)  (Herod. ii.,  81),  wastheChtlio- 
nian  deity,  Dionysus  Zagreus,  closely  connected  with  Demeter  and 
Cora  (Ceres  and  Proserpine),  who  was  the  personified  expression, 


64  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE, 

not  only  of  the  most  rapturous  pleasure,  but  also  of  a  deep  sorrow 
for  the  miseries  of  human  life. " 

When,  therefore,  Bacon  writes  of  Orpheus  Theatre,  upon 
page  49,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640  (the  next  paf?e  being  mis- 
paged  52,  Shakespeare's  age,  1616,  when  he  died),  it  is  a  pretty 
plain  hint  for  the  Drama,  or  Theatre  of  Bacchus.  "  I  going  the 
same  road  as  the  Ancients, "  writes  Bacon;  and  Ben  Jonson  uses 
exactly  the  same  words  for  Bacon,  he  employs  to  eulogize  Shake- 
speare, viz.,  that  he  had  beaten  all  that  *'  insolent  Greece  or  haughty 
Borne  "  had  done. 

That  Bacon  connotes  Ceres  and  Bacchus  with  Orpheus  may  be 
seen  upon  page  49  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640,  the  next 
page  being  mispaged  52  (for  50),  which  was  Shakespeare's  full  age 
in  1616,  when  he  died.  I  take  it,  Orpheus  with  Bacon  is  an  obscure 
and  a  guarded  hint  for  the  theatre  or  drama,  the  origins  of  which 
Orpheus  founded;  his  name  (as  we  have  seen  from  Mr.  Brown's 
Great  Bionysiak  Myth)  being  synonymous  with  the  Bacchic  (or 
dramatic,  rightly  interpreted)  Mysteries.  On  this  page  Bacon 
writes : 

*'  Founders  of  states,  law-givers,  extirpers  of  tyrants,  fathers  of 
their  country,  and  other  eminent  persons  in  civil  merit,  were  hon- 
ored with  the  title  of  worthies  only,  or  demi-gods — such  as  were 
Theseus,  Minos,  Koniulus,  and  the  like.  On  the  other  side,  such  as 
were  inventors  and  authors  of  new  arts,  and  such  as 
endowed  man's  life  with  new  commodities  and  accessions,  weie 
ever  consecrated  among  the  greater  and  entire  gods,  which  hap- 
pened to  Ceres,  Bacchus,  ^Mercury,  Apollo,  and  others." 
(II.  49,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 

Note  the  distinction  Bacon  introduces  touching  New  Arts,  and 
how  he  here  classes  and  brackets  together,  the  four  chief  protagonists 
of  the  classical  drama,  round  whose  worship  it  indeed  arose.  Upon 
the  same  page,  and  in  close  context  with  all  this,  he  says :  "  And  this 
kind  of  merit  was  lively  set  forth  in  that  Feigned  Relation  of 
Orpheus  Theatre."  {lb.  p.  49.)  Directly  we  turn  to  Bacon's 
description  of  dramatical  poesy,  we  read :  "  For  there  are  feigned 
chronicles,  feigned  lives,  and  feigned  relations, — in  this,  that  it  is 
either  Narrative  or  Representative,  or  Allusive.  Narrative  is  a  mere 
imitatioil  of  History.  Dramatical  or  Representative  is,  as  it 
were,  a  visible  History,  for  it  sets  out  the  image  of  things  as  if  they 
were  present,  and  history  as  if  they  were  passed."  {Ih.  p.  106.) 
The  reader  sees  how  determined  Bacon  is  to  hint,  in  context  with 
the  theatre  and  drama^  of  some  feigned  relation.    And  to  give  us 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  65 

another  and  still  more  forcible  hint,  he  describes  the  difficulties 
attending  the  writing  of  Lives  as  History.  ^*  Of  these,  Chronicles 
seem  to  excel  for  celebrity  and  name,  Lives  for  profit  and  examples, 
Relations  for  Sikcerity  and  Verity.  "    {lb.,  p.  93.) 

Again,  *'  As  concerning  Belations  (of  Lives),  it  could  be,  in  truth, 
wished  that  Viere  were  a  greater  diligence  taken  therein.  For  such 
collections  might  be  as  a  Nursery  garden,  whereby  to  plant  a  fair 
and  stately  garden,  when  time  should  serve.''    {lb.,  p.  97.) 

In  1616  Bacon  was  in  his  56th  year,  that  being  the  year  Shak- 
spere  died,  in  his  53rd  year  (Stratford  monument:  obiit  cetatis  53). 
The  reader  will,  therefore,  perceive  pages  55,  56  represent  Bacon's 
two  ages  1616  —  full  years  and  year  he  had  just  entered.  But  55  is 
mispaged  53,  thus  Shakespeare  and  Bacon  are  identified  by  cipher 
mispaging  1616.  I  am  convinced  Julius  Caesar  is  another  portrait 
for  Bacon  by  analogy.  Caesar  was  king,  de  facto,  in  all  but  name. 
That  was  also  Bacon's  position  with  regard  to  the  plays.  Bacon 
writes  (page  56) : 

"  Caesar  did  extremely  affect  the  name  of  Icing,  therefore,  some 
were  set  on,  as  he  passed  by,  in  popular  acclamation  to  salute  him 
king;  he  finding  the  cry  weak  and  poor  put  off  the  matter  with  a 
jest,  as  if  tlwy  had  missed  his  surname,  Non  Bex  sum  (saith  he), 
sed  Ccesar.  Indeed  such  a  speech,  as  if  it  be  exactly  searched,  the 
life  and  fullness  of  it  can  scarce  be  expressed.''^ 

The  profound  student  must  here  perceive  the  striking  analogy 
presented  between  Bacon  and  Caesar  in  this  passage,  touching  sur- 
names and  authorship  of  the  plays.  Bacon,  like  Caesar,  lacks  the 
title  or  kingship  of  the  1623  Folio  Plays,  which  revolves  upon  a  sur- 
name only.  Like  Caesar,  he  is,  de  facto,  king,  but  without  the  title, 
and  it  is  probable  Bacon,  like  Caesar,  was  the  victim  of  some  con- 
spiracy against  him.  "  The  truth  of  being,  and  the  truth  of  know- 
ing are  all  one, "  Bacon  writes ;  and  this  is  reflected  in  the  passage 
quoted. 

Upon  page  53  (false).  Bacon  quotes  from  Suetonius  Tranquillus^ 
Life  of  Julius  Ccesar,  twice  referring  to  paragraph  56  in  the  margin. 
It  is  very  striking,  upon  reference  to  the  paragraph  alluded,  to  find 
it  opening  with  the  question  of  Julius  Caesar's  authorship  with 
regard  to  certain  doubtful  works,  ciphers,  and  that  Ccesar  was  sup- 
posed to  have  written  plays.  Another  hint  is  Asinius  Pollio,  who 
was  an  anonymous  or  concealed  playwright.  In  the  Holy  War,  by 
Bacon,  there  is  a  character  called  Pollio,  probably  Bacon  himself  It 
is  also  striking,  upon  page  56  of  the  reproduced  page  of  the 
Advancement,  there  is  reference  to  the  Apophthegms  of  Csesar,  men- 


66  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

tioned  by  S.  Tranquillus  (Dicta  Collectanea).  We  may  thus  see, 
BacoD,  in  selecting  Alexander  the  Great,  Julius  Caesar,  and  Pollio, 
presents  us  with  three  great  concealed  authors,  some  of  ivhose 
works  ivere  doubtful. 

"  (56.)  Reliquit  et  rerum  suarum  commentarios,  Gallici  civilisque 
belli  Pompeiani.  Nam  Alexandrini,  Africanique  et  Hispaniensis, 
incertus  auctor  est.  Alii  Oppium  putant,  alii  Hirtium,  qui  etiam 
Gallici  belli  novissimum  imperfectumque  librum  suppleverit.  De 
commentariis  Cicero  in  eodum  Bruto  sic  refert :  '  Commentarios 
scripsit,  valde  quidem  probandus :  nudi  sunt,  recti,  et  venusti,  omni 
ornatu  orationis,  tamquam  veste  detracta:  sed,  dum  voluit  alios 
habere  parata,  unde  sumerent,  qui  vellent  scribere  historiam,  ineptis 
gratum  fortasse  fecit,  qui  ilia  volent  calamistris  inurere;  sanos  qui- 
dem homines  a  scribendo  deterruit.'  De  iisdem  commentariis 
Hirtius  ita  prsedicat :  '  Adeo  probantur  omnium  judicio,  ut  praerepta, 
non  prsebita,  facultas  scriptoribus  videatur.  Cujus  tamen  rei  major 
nostra,  quam  reliquorum,  est  admiratio.  Caeteri  enim,  quam  bene 
atque  emendate,  nos  etiam,  quam  facile  atque  celeritur  eos  per- 
scripserit,  scimus.'  Polho  Asinius,  parum  diligentur,  parumque 
Integra  veritate,  composites  putat,  cum  Caesar  pleraque,  et  quae  per 
alios  erant  gesta,  temere  crediderit,  et  quae  per  se,  vcl  consulto,  vel 
etiam  memoria  lapsus,  perperam  ediderit:  existimatque,  rescripturnm 
et  correcturum  fuisse.  Eeliquit  et  'Be  Analogia^  hbros  duos,  et 
'  Anticatones^  totidem,  ac  praeterea  poema,  quod  inscribitur  'Iter.' 
Quorum  librorum  primos  in  transitu  Alpium,  cum  ex  citeriore  Gallic, 
conventibus  peractis,  ad  exercitum  rediret :  sequentes  sub  tempus 
Mundensis  proelii  fecit;  novissimum,  dum  ab  Urbe  in  Hispaniam 
ulteriorem  quarto  et  vicesimo  die  pervenit.  Epistolae  quoque  ejus  ad 
senatum  exstant,  quas  primus  videtur  ad  paginas  et  formam  memor- 
ialis  libelli  convertisse,  cum  antea  consules,  et  duces  non  nisi  trans- 
versa charta  scriptas  mitterent.  Exstant  et  ad  Ciceronem,  item  ad 
familiaris  domesticis  de  rebus ;  in  quibus,  si  qua  occultius  perferenda 
erant,  per  notas  scripsit,  id  est,  sic  structo  literarum  ordine,  ut 
nullum  verbum  efflci  posset;  quce  si  quis  investigare  etpersequi  velit, 
quartam  elementorum  liter  am,  \d  est,  B.  pro  A,  et  perinde  reliquas 
commutet.  Feruntur  et  a  puero  et  ab  adolescentulo  quondam  scripta  : 
ut  *  Laudes  Her  cutis,'  tragoedia  '  (Edipus,'  item  '  Bid  a  collec 
tanea:'  quos  omnes  libellos  vetuit  Augustus  publicari,  in  epistola, 
quam,  brevem  admodum  ac  simplicem,  ad  Pompeium  Macrum,  cui 
ordinandas  bibliothecas  delegaverat,  misit."  (Suetonius  Tran- 
quillus.) 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  67 

If  the  reader  will  count  the  words  in  italics  upon  the  second  (or 
correct  page)  52  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning,  which  we  repro- 
duce, he  will  find  these  numbers  against  these  words : 
Booh      61     counted     55    up 
of        62       down       54    up 
Nature    63    the  page    53    up 

These  figures  are  remarkable,  because  62-63  represent  Lord 
Bacon's  age  in  1623,  when  the  first  folio  edition  of  the  plays  were 
published;  that  is,  Bacon  was  62  years  old  and  in  his  63d  year. 
This  we  know  from  the  monument  in  St.  Michael's  Church,  St. 
Albans,  which  states  Bacon  died  in  his  66th  year — 1626.  (^tatis 
LXVI.)  On  the  Stratford  monument  Shakespeare  is  stated  to  have 
died  in  his  53d  year.  (Obiit,  setatis  53,  1616.)  It  is,  therefore,  curi- 
ous to  find  53  against  63,  suggesting  1616,  1623  with  regard  to 
Shakespeare's  and  Bacon's  respective  ages  at  these  two  dates. 
Bacon  was  55  years  old  and  in  his  56th  year  in  1616,  when 
Shakespeare  died.  That  number  may  also  be  seen  against  the 
word  Book.  Seeing  all  this  is  to  be  found  upon  page  52  of  his 
Advancement,  I  am  seriously  postulating  the  theory,  this  Book  of 
Nature  may  refer  to  the  plays.  The  reader  will  also  note  the  words 
"  PRECIOUS  CABINET  OF  Daeitjs,  "  in  which  Homer's  works  were 
kept  by  Alexander  the  Great.  A  similar  crossing  of  the  numbers 
53  and  63  may  be  found  on  counting  the  Italicized  words  as  before, 
up  and  down. 

Of         52,  64 
Darius  53,  63 

In  the  first  part  of  King  Henry  the  Sixth  (scene  vi.),  these  lines 
are  to  be  found: 

A  stateher  pyramid  to  her  I'll  rear 
Than  Rhodope's  or  Memphis'  ever  was 
In  memory  of  her  when  she  is  dead. 
Her  ashes,  in  an  urn  more  precious 
Than  the  rich,  jewelled  coffer  of  Darius. 

All  this  is  excessively  suspicious.  *'  An  urn  "  are  the  fifty-second 
and  fifty- third  words  from  the  bottom  of  column  201  (page  101,  His- 
tories, 1623  Folio).  Homer  is  the  fifty-eighth  word  (up  and  down)  in 
italics,  upon  this  page  52  of  the  Advancement  I  allude  to.  The 
first  mispaging  of  the  1623  folio  falls  upon  page  50,  and  is  58. 

In  Bacon's  Advertisement  of  a  Holy  War,  one  of  the  characters 
of  the  five  persons  who  make  up  the  dialogue  is  called  Pollio.  This 
name  evidently  is  borrowed  from  Virgil's  fourth  Eclogue,  entitled 


68  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURK 

Pollio,  and  which  treats  of  the  Beturn  of  the  Golden  Age,  as 
prophesied  by  the  Sybil.  I  suspect  Polho  is  meant  for  Bacon 
himself,  by  the  way  he  is  introduced,  and  the  part  he  plays  in  the 
dialogue.  In  Virgil's  eighth  Eclogue  or  Bucohc,  entitled  Chemistry 
(Pharmaceutria),  a  comphment  is  paid  to  somebody,  who  is  evidently 
a  tragic  play  writer ,  and  whom  commentators  suppose  to  be  PoUio : 

En  erit,  ut  liceat  totum  mihi  ferre  per  orbem 
Sola  Sophocleo  tua  carmina  digna  cothuruo. 

Servius  remarks  "  Alii  ideo  hoc  de  Pollione  dictum  volunt,  q^uod 
et  ipse  utriusque  linguce  tragoediarum,  scriptor  fuit.  Cothurnus 
autem  calciamentum  tragicum,  cujus  usum  quidam  Sophoclem 
primum  scsense  intulisse  volunt "  (p.  93  Comm.  in  Verg.  Buc. 
viii.1-12). 

This  is  the  more  striking,  because  a  line  out  of  this  Eclogue  or 
Bucolic  is  quoted  by  Bacon  in  his  De  Augment  is,, svis,]}ic\ous\y  in 
context  with  what  he  calls,  The  Pkudence  of  Private  Speech, 
page  210  (false  for  282,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640),  evidently  a 
hint  for  writing  obscurely  and  guardedly  by  allusion  indirect,  or  by 
parallels,  analogy  and  hints.  It  is  given  us  in  order  we  may  prick  up 
our  mental  ears  and  try  to  fathom  his  language.  This  line  he  quotes 
is  56  (Bacon's  age,  1616): 

Certent  et  Cycnis  ululas :  sit  Tityrus  Orpheus :  . 
Orpheus  in  sylvis  ;  inter  delphinas  Arion. —  55. 

It  is  only  this  last  hue  in  itahcs  Bacon  quotes,  but  the  context 
is  the  really  important  to  quote.  Because  Shakespeare  was 
known  by  the  name  of  the  "  Sweet  Swan  or  Avon,"  and  Bacon, 
on  page  96  of  the  1640,  Advancement  of  Learning,  makes  some 
strange  remarks  relating  to  swans,  and  their  immortality ;  lost 
names  engraved  upon  medals  being  carried  off  by  swans  and  other 
birds.  We  find  Arion  was  the  Inventor  or  the  Tragic  Chorus 
OR  Dithyramb  !  Thus,  if  Bacon  wanted  to  give  us  a  hint,  and 
to  laugh  profoundly  at  Shakespeare,  or  the  Swan  of  Avon,  no  possi- 
ble lines  could  be  more  forcible.  Because  in  the  person  of  Tityrus, 
some  incompetent,  arrogant,  well-known  person,  pretending  to  be  a 
poet,  is  satyrized,  and  compared  ironically  to  Orpheus  and  Arion. 
All  this  receives  further  force  when  we  find  Bacon,  in  this  same 
work,  writing  of  "  Orpheus  Theatre  "  (p.  49),  and  also,  in  his  fable 
upon  the  same  subject,  introducing  Helicon.  Thus,  both  by  Pollio 
and  this  line,  there  seems  to  be  parallels  for  the  drama  and  tragedy. 
Servius  remarks  upon  this  passage  of  Virgil's,  "  Sit  Tityrus 
Orpheus.     Vilissimus  rusticus  Orpheus  putetur  in  sylvis,  Arion 


THE  C0LU3IBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  69 

vero  inter  delphinas  "  (p.  101).  Owls  contend  with  swans,  Shake- 
speare pretends  to  be  Bacon,  and  just  in  this  point  touching  tragedy, 
invented  by  Arion !  But  the  strange  part  is  upon  the  title  page 
engraving  of  this  work,  the  Advancement  of  1640  (translated  by 
Wats)  are  two  owls  holding  up  a  torch  in  their  talons ! 

"  As  a  poet  Pollio  was  best  known  for  his  Tragedies,  which  are 
spoken  of  in  high  terms  by  Virgil  and  Horace.  (Virgil  Eclogue  iii. 
86,  viii.  10;  Horace  Carm.  ii.  1.  9,  Sat.  1,  10,  42;  Charis  1,  p.  56,  ed. 
Luid.)  The  words  of  Virgil  (Eel.  iii.  86) — 'Pollio  et  ipse  facit  nova 
Carmina/  probably  refer  to  I>•a^e<^^■e5  of  a  new  kind,  namely,  such  as 
were  not  borrowed  from  the  Greek,  but  contained  subjects  entirely 
taken  from  Eoman  story."  (Welcker,  Die  Griechischen  Trago- 
(lien,  p.  1421,  etc.)  (Vide  diet.  Greek  and  Moman  Myth.,  Wm.  Smith, 
vol.  iii.  p.  439.)  The  authorities  for  the  life  of  Pollio  are  Cicero  {ad. 
Fam.  ix.  25,  x.  31,  xi.  9,  ad.  Att.  xii.  2;  38,  39,  xiii.  20;  Appian  B.C. 
ii.  40,  45,  82,  iii.  46,  74,  97,  iv.  12,  27,  v.  20-23,  (50  64;  Veil  Pat.  ii. 
63,  76,  86;  Dion  Cass  xlv.  10,  xlviii.  15,  41;)  and  among  modern 
writers  Eckhard  and  Thorhecke. 

It  is  well  worthy  note  Virgil's  Eclogue  entitled  Pollio,  carries 
also  the  title  Pharmaceutria  ;  that  is,  it  is  Alchymical.  This  is  per- 
fectly comprehensible,  inasmuch  as  it  refers  to  the  Age  of  Gold,  or 
Saturn.  And  it  is  highly  probable  Virgil,  who  was  fully  initiated 
into  all  the  mysteries,  refers  to  some  alchymical  knowledge  extant, 
and  hidden  under  the  recondite  lore  of  the  mysteries  of  his  age.  It 
is  highly  significant  Bacon  imitates  this  in  his  Hoty  War,  for  he 
describes  the  five  speakers  as  the  four  elements  and  the  fifth  essence. 
The  scheme  or  aim  of  the  Holi/  War  is  ideal;  that  is,  perfectly 
Saturnian.  For  the  aim  of  the  Knights  Templar  was  the  rebuild- 
ing of  the  Temple  of  Solomon,  or  House  of  Wisdom ;  that  is,  a 
restoration  of  the  church.  I  think  on  this  ground  Bacon's  term, 
Instauration,  or  Bestoration  (as  he  repeatedly  calls  it),  may  be 
understood.  The  Rosicrucians  always  write  of  a  restoration  of  arts 
and  sciences,  of  morals,  of  religion,  and  their  end  was  a  restoration 
of  the  estate  of  man  before  the  fall — to  his  original  state  of 
dominion  over  nature — the  Golden  Age  of  Atlantis  and  of  Saturn. 
Bacon  hints  at  all  this  in  many  ways.    He  writes : 

*'  That  sailing  of  Hercules  in  a  cup  (to  set  Prometheus  at  liberty) 
seems  to  represent  an  image  of  the  Divine  Word,  coming  in 
tiesh,  as  in  a  frail  vessel,  to  redeem  men  from  the  slavery  of  Hell.'' 
(Prometheus,  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients.) 

Bacon  here  clearly  identifies  the  Divine  word  with  the  Logos, 


70  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

and  Spirit  of  Christ,  made  flesh  ;  that  is,  humanity  must  be  imbued 
and  saturated  with  this  spirit  to  set  themselves  free.  Virgil's 
Eclogue,  written  at  the  time  of  the  appearance  of  Christianity,  is 
supposed  to  embrace  the  wonderful  prophecy  of  the  Sybil  concern- 
ing Christ.  It  may  be  read  in  two  ways :  either  as  the  end  for 
which  Christianity  was  about  to  work,  viz.,  a  return  of  the  golden^ 
age  unfulfilled  as  yet,  or  as  a  prophecy  of  its  immediate  advent- 
But  the  reader  must  see  how  in  keeping  all  this  is  with  the  ideal 
spirit  in  which  Bacon's  Holi/  War  is  written;  that  is,  a  Restoration 
or  rebuilding  of  the  Temple ;  that  is,  the  house  of  which  men  are 
the  stones. 


CHAPTER  III. 

Father  Paul  and  Father  Fulgentio,  Franciscan  Friars 

OF  Venice. 

Oph.    My  lord,  as  I  was  sewing  in  my  closet, 
Lord  Hamlet,  with  his  doublet  all  unbraced ; 
No  hat  upon  his  head ;  his  stockings  foul'd, 
TTngarter'd,  and  down-gyved  to  his  ancle ; 
Pale  as  his  shirt;  his  knees  knocking  each  other ; 
And  with  a  look  so  piteous  in  purport 
As  if  he  had  been  loosed  out  of  helL 
To  speak  of  horrors,  —  he  comes  before  me. 

[Hamlet,  Act  11. ,  Sc.  I.) 

A  great  deal  may  be  discovered  concerning  Lord  Bacon's  ends 
and  aims  by  study  of  his  times,  contemporaries,  and  the  people  he 
corresponded  with.  We  know  he  was  in  secret  correspondence  with 
Father  Fulgentio,  for  a  letter  of  Bacon's  is  extant,  in  which  he 
explains  to  the  former  the  plan  and  scope  of  his  Instauration.  Arch- 
bishop Tenison,  in  his  Baconiana  or  certain  genuine  remains  of  Lord 
Bacon  (1679),  opens  his  work  with  a  suspicious  reference  to  Bocca- 
linVs  Ragguagli  di  Parnasso,  from  which  work  was  borrowed  the 
first  Rosicrucian  manifesto  entitled,  A  Beformation  of  the  Whole 
Wide  World. 

"In  this  last  and  most  comprehensive  account,  I  have,  on  pur- 
pose, used  a  loose  and  Asiatic  style,  and  wilfully  committed  that 
venial  fault  with  which  the  Laconian  (in  Boccalini)  is  merrily  taxed, 
who  had  said  that  in  three  words,  which  he  might  possibly  have 
expressed  in  tivo.  I  hop'd,  by  this  means,  to  serve  the  more  effectu- 
ally, ordinary  readers,  who  stand  chiefly  in  need  of  this  Introduc- 
tion ;  and  whose  capacities  can  be  no  more  reach'd  by  a  close  and 
strict  discourse,  than  game  can  be  taken  by  a  net  unspread. ''  (p.  4.) 

It  is  easy  to  preceive  the  author  is  hinting  that  his  style  is  not 
laconic  but  circumlocutory,  and  that  there  is  an  object  for  ambiguity 
in  order  to  catch  or  deceive  the  ordinary  reader. 

Upon  the  next  page  we  read : 

'^  It  is  true,  there  lived  in  part  of  the  last,  and  this,  century, 
many  memorable  advancers  of  philosophical  knowledge.  I  mean 
not  here  such  as  Patricius,  or  Telesius,  Brunus,  Severinus  the  Dane, 
or  Campanella.    These,  indeed,  departed  from  some  errors  of  the 

71 


72  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

ancients,  but  they  did  not  frame  any  solid  hypothesis  of  their  own. 
They  only  spun  new  cobwebs,  where  they  had  brush'd  down  the 
old.  Nay,  I  intend  not,  in  this  place,  either  Descartes  or  Gas- 
sendi.  They  were,  certainly,  great  men,  but  they  appeared 
somewhat  later,  and  descended  into  the  depths  of  philosophy,  after 
the  ice  had  been  broken  by  others.  And  those  I  take  to  have  been 
chiefly  Copernicus,  Father  Paul  the  Venetian,  Galileo,  Harvey,  Gil- 
bert, and  tlie  philosopher  before-remembered,  Sir  Francis  Bacon, 
who,  if  all  his  circumstances  be  duly  weigh'd,  may  seem  to  excel 
them  all." 

The  first  thing  striking  us,  is  the  introduction  of  such  names  as 
Bruno,  who  was  martyred  in  1600,  and  whose  theory  that  the  stars 
were  fixed  fires,  is  palpably  introduced  in  Hamlet.  Of  Father  Paul 
the  Venetian,  I  have  a  great  deal  to  say.  For  I  happen  to  possess 
his  letters  written  to  Monsieur  Del  Isle  Groslot,  a  noble  Protestant 
of  France,  Monsieur  Gillot,  and  others,  in  a  correspondeuce  of  seven 
years.  (Translated  out  of  Italian  by  Edward  Brown,  rector  of 
Sandridge,  in  Kent,  1693.)  The  interesting  part  of  these  letters  is, 
they  contain  a  great  many  references  to  Father  Fulgentio,  Bacon's 
friend.  Before  I  proceed  to  touch  upon  this,  I  would  like  to  point 
out,  how  Father  Paul  invents  a  cipher  and  frequently  alludes  to  it, 
showing  how  cipher  writing  was  one  of  the  safeguards,  and  indis- 
pensable literary  accomplishments  in  those  days,  of  all  who  had 
important  secrets  to  reveal,  or  were  at  war  with  the  Papacy.  Both 
Father  Paul  and  Father  Fulgentio  were  excommunicated  by  the 
Papal  power,  and  it  will  appear  plain  to  the  reader,  from  the 
advertisement  of  the  second  volume,  that  Father  Fulgentio  and 
Father  Paul  were  upon  t^rms  of  the  closest  intimacy,  inasmuch  as 
the  life  of  the  latter  was  written  by  the  former. 

The  translator  of  the  first  volume  writes : 

*'  The  second  volume  will  consist  of  the  Life  of  Father  Paul, 
written  by  Father  Fulgentio,  with  Notes  upon  many  passages  of  it ; 
and  a  Treatise  of  the  Interdict,  written  by  Father  Paul,  and  of  other 
divines  of  Venice,  in  the  time  of  controversy  between  Pope  Paul  V., 
and  the  most  serene  Republic  of  Venice,  never  published  in  English 
before;  together  with  the  answer  of  John  Marfllio,  Father  Paul, 
and  Father  Fulgentio,  to  the  sentence  of  excommunication,  citation 
and  admonition  issued  out  against  them." 

Father  Fulgentio  was  a  brother  of  the  order  of  St.  FrA]N'CIS  — 
in  short,  a  Franciscan  friar.  It  may  not  be  amiss  to  observe  that 
Father  Lawrence,  in  the  play  of  Romeo  and  Juliet,  is  described  also 
as  a  Franciscan  friar. 

Archbishop  Tenison  describes  Father  Paul  as  follows : 

"  Father  Paul  was  a  more  general  philosopher,  and  the  head 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  73 

of  a  meeting  of  virtuosi  in  Venice.  He  excelled  in  mechanics,  in 
mathematics  of  all  kinds,  in  philological  learning,  in  anatomy.  In 
his  anatomical  studies,  he  exercised  such  sagacity,  that  he  made 
further  discoveries  in  the  fabric  of  the  eye,  and  taught  Aqua- 
pendente,  those  new  speculations  which  he  published  on  that  sub- 
ject; he  found  out  (saith  Fulgentio)  the  valvulse  in  the  veins,  and 
began  the  doctrine  of  the  circulation  of  the  blood.  Though  there 
is  reason  to  believe,  that  he  received  the  hints  of  it  from  Sir  Henry 
Wotton,  himself  had  taken  them  from  Dr.  Harvey,  i  But,  the 
present  state  of  the  affairs  of  Venice  so  requiring.  Father  Paul  bent 
his  studies  to  ecclesiastical  polity,  and  chiefiy  employed  his  pen  in 
detecting  the  usurpations  and  corruptions  of  the  Papacy ;  endeav- 
ouring (so  far  as  books  could  do  it)  to  preserve  the  neck  of  that 
repubhc  from  the  bondage  of  Paul  the  Fifth,  who  attempted  to 
set  his  foot  upon  it.''     {Baconiana,  pp.  7-8.) 

In  the  letters  of  Father  Paul,  I  find  a  number  of  references  to  a 
Father  Molino.  Bacon,  in  his  letter  to  Father  Fulgentio,  concludes 
with  a  reference  to  the  former,  showing  he  was  in  correspondence 
with  him : 

"  I  pray  your  Fatherhood,  to  commend  me  to  that  most  excel- 
lent man,  Signior  Molines,  to  whose  most  delightful  and  prudent 
letters  I  will  return  answer  shortly,  if  God  permit.  Farewell,  most 
lie verend  Father."  ♦  {Baconiana, p. ^00.) 

I  now  proceed  to  give  a  number  of  extracts  from  the  letters  of 
Father  Paul,  touching  his  use  of  ciphers : 

*'  If  Monsieur  Aleaume  would  be  pleased  to  put  the  cypher  into 
some  method,  he  would  do  a  very  worthy  work.  I  am  mightily 
afraid  that  the  matter  is  not  capable  of  such  art,  and  the  infinity  of 
it  makes  me  think  so;  nor  can  I  perceive  how  that  is  possible  to 
be  reduced  to  art,  which  is  not  reducible  to  number.  I  am  of  the 
mind  that  I  have  a  cypher  which  may  be  kept  in  memory  (which  is 
very  considerable,  in  case  the  key  or  counter -cypher  should  be  lost 
or  stolen),  and  I  believe  'tis  impossible  to  get  it  read  without  a  key, 
because  it  varies  infinitely ;  and  one  character  hath  never  the  same 
signification  twice .  but  'tis  difi&cult  to  write  for  the  danger  of 
mistaking,  which  if  a  man  should  do  but  in  one  character,  his  friend 
may  go  whistle  to  understand  it ;  which  makes  it  of  no  great  use." 
(Ch.  xxiv.  p.  110.) 

"  The  collection  of  ray  memoirs  {ivhich  you  know)  is  grown  to  a 
great  bulk;  and  there  are  some  reasons  which  you  may  guess  at  to 
make  me  keep  it  by  mc,  and  not  being  able  to  be  idle  in  the  mean 
while,  I  have  transcribed  the  very  words  ;  but  those  reasons  do  still 
follow  me,  and  increase  upon  me,  which  keep  my  mind  in  a  state  of 
suspense.    I  wish  I  could   communicate   them   to  you;    and   for 

1 "  Descartes  diff^  de  Methodo,  p.  46,  Herveo  laiis  hcec  tribneiida  est  quod  primam 
ill  ista  materia  glaciem  fregerit,  <fec." 


74  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

this  reason  I  was  thiuking  to  send  yon  a  cypher  by  this  dispatch, 
but  I  have  not  time  to  compose  it,  By  the  next  courier  I  will  come 
a  httle  to  some  particulars  with  you,  and  through  your  means,  with 
Monsieur  Thuanus,  to  try  if  any  good  can  be  done/"  (Letter  xxxv. 
p.  138.) 

In  chapter  xli.  we  read  of  the  "  Fathers  cypher j  and  the  neces- 
sity for  it,  by  reason  of  his  backfriends :  " 

"  1  have  made  some  small  matter  of  cypher,  as  you  seemed  to 
desire  of  me  in  yours  of  February  the  third,  having  tried  to  make 
it  fit  common  words,  and  the  French  tongue  also,  that  you  may  not 
be  put  to  writing  in  Italian.  And  though  the  cypher  is  but  barren  of 
words,  yet  we  may  daily  make  it  more  copious  by  the  alphabet. 
But  so  long  as  Signer  Folcarini  stays  in  France,  letters  will  come 
always  safe. 

'^  There  will  be  the  greatest  difficulty  of  all  when  he  goes  away, 
because  there  will  be  nOne  to  succeed  him,  that  is  comparable  to 
him ;  and  if  letters  should  be  sent  by  themselves  out  of  the  public 
cover,  ^tis  a  million  to  one  but  they  would  be  intercepted;  so  many 
there  are  that  look  out  for  such  business,  to  gratify  my  back- 
friends. "    ( Letter  xli.) 

In  chapter  xliv.  page  153,  we  read : 

"  The  cypher  must  needs  be  imperfect,  as  it  is  done  by  me,  who 
understand  nothing  to  speak  of  in  that  sort  of  art.  I  must  intreat  you 
to  complete  it,  when  it  fails  in  syllables,  as  you  show  me,  and  any- 
thing else  where  you  see  fit. " 

These  letters  commence  with  September,  1607,  and  conclude  with 
the  date  December,  1609 ;  that  is,  they  stretch  over  a  period  of  two 
years,  and  are  mostly  written  from  Venice,  with  a  few  from  Padua. 
Here  let  me  note  that  Boccalini  (who  was  cudgeled  to  death,  1612) 
was  a  Venetian,  and  that  the  Bagguagli  di  Parnasso,  by  him,  which 
is  so  interesting  a  work  (on  account  of  its  enigmatic  style,  and  for 
its  Kosicrucian  connections),  was  first  published  at  Venice. 

"  I  have  oftentimes  thought  to  enlarge  the  cypher  by  notes  for 
the  most  usual  syllables,  but  because  they  are  not  the  same  in  your 
language  with  those  of  ours,  I  could  not  well  do  it.  The  most  usual 
ones  with  us  are  those  which  are  in  the  declining  of  verbs ;  but  the 
French  declension  is  so  different,  that  tliose  will  not  serve  here.  As 
for  the  letter  X,  not  to  confound  it  with  any  other,  the  character 
for  it  may  be  Z  Z,  and  so  I  have  it  in  my  cypher  "  (p.  202). 

'^  Out  of  a  desire  of  the  continuance  of  our  correspondence  by 
letters,  which  we  cannot  keep  on  without  a  cypher,  nor  that  thor- 
oughly, unless  the  cypher  be  easy;  I  have  therefore  often  tried  to  in- 
large  that  which  we  have  had  with  each  other  hitherto;  but  I  have 
met  with  insuperable  difficulties  in  it,  as  I  have  had  a  mind  to  have 
it  serve  your  language  and  ours;  and  therefore  I  have  at  last  pitched 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  75 

upon  this  present  one,  which  I  now  send  you,  which  has  no  need  of 
any  great  attention  to  anything,  nor  search  for  characters,  either  in 
writing  it  or  undrstanding  it;  but  the  only  copying  of  it  will  be 
enough.  In  the  writing  we  go  by  Arabic  numbers;  and  it  is  copied 
out  by  Roman  numbers."    p.  234.) 

This  will,  I  think,  suffice  (as  to  extracts)  to  show  how  indispens- 
able a  weapon  of  defense  and  security,  was  the  art  of  secret 
writing  or  steganography,  at  the  period  we  allude  to  (1607-1609), 
when  Lord  Bacon  was  from  46  to  48  years  old.  We  can  hardly  bo 
astonished  he  turned  his  attention  early  to  the  Invention  of  a  cypher 
when  he  was  at  Paris.  This  cypher  he  introduces  in  his  Be  Aug- 
mentis,  pp.  264,  265,  266,  267,  268,  and  it  may  be  as  well  to  quote 
Bacon's  words  with  regard  to  it : 

^'  But  it  may  be,  that  in  the  enumeration,  and,  as  it  were,  taxa- 
tion of  arts,  some  may  think  that  ive  go  about  to  make  a  great  muster- 
roll  of  sciences,  that  the  multiplication  of  them  may  be  the  more 
admired;  when  their  number,  perchance,  may  be  displayed,  but 
their  forces  in  so  short  a  treatise  can  hardly  be  tried.  Neither  have 
we  (in  our  opinion)  touched  these  arts  perfunctorily,  though  cursorily ; 
hut  with  a  piercing  style  extracted  the  marrow  and  pith  of  them  out  of 
a  mass  of  matter.  The  judgment  hereof  ive  refer  to  those  who  are 
most  able  to  judge  of  these  arts.  For  seeing  it  is  the  fashion  of  many 
who  would  be  thought  to  know  much,  that  everywhere  making 
ostentation  of  words  and  outward  terms  of  arts,  they  become  a 
wonder  to  the  ignorant,  but  a  derision  to  those  who  are  masters  of 
those  arts.  We  hope  that  our  labours  shall  have  a  contrary  success^ 
which  is  that  they  may  arrest  the  judgment  of  every  one  2vho  is  best 
versed  in  every  particular  art,  and  be  undervalued  by  the  rest.'^ 
(p.  270  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 

This  passage  demonstrates  forcibly,  Bacon's  cypher  (which  he 
designates  "  the  organ  of  speech, "  p.  271)  was  not  introduced  without 
purport,  or  as  a  mere  member  of  his  sciences  for  the  sake  of  swelling 
their  muster-roll.  He  tells  us  plainly  that  it  has  been  extracted,  "  out 
of  a  mass  of  matter,^'  a  hint  we  should  do  well  to  digest.  We  are 
further  challenged,  and  invited  to  examine  and  judge  upon  it,  if  ive 
are  masters  of  these  arts!  In  the  final  words  of  the  passage  cited. 
Bacon  hopes  this  cypher  "  may  arrest  the  judgment  '''of  the  capable 
decypherer !  The  whole  of  this  passage  is  pregnant  with  a  profound 
undercurrent  of  irony,  pointed  at  purposeless  examples  of  cyphers. 
It  is  indeed  a  curious  coincidence  that  Bacon  introduces  the  subject 
of  cyphers,  upon  page  264  (upon  the  heels  of  an  allusion  to  poetry), 
and  that  the  subject,  with  examples  of  a  bi-literal  alphabet,  is 
continued  through  pages  265,  266,  267, 268, 269,  and  concluded  upon 


76  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE, 

pages  270,  271.  These  figures  constitute  the  exact  numbers  of 
the  line  : 

Hang  Hog  is  Latin  for  Bacon,  I  warrant  you, 

upon  page  53,  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor.  This  coincidence,  taken 
into  consideration  with  the  fact  the  same  work  (Advancement  of 
Learning,  1640),  is  mispaged  twice,  52,  53  (being  Shakespeare's  age, 
1616,  when  he  died,  as  stated  on  the  Stratford  monument),  can 
hardly  be  the  result  of  accident. 

The  character  of  the  age  and  times  when  Father  Paul  wrote 
these  letters  may  be  gathered  from  the  following  extract : 

"  What  a  strange  unhappiness  is  the  present  age  surrounded 
with !  It  looks  to  me  like  the  time  of  a  plague,  wherein  every  dis- 
ease turns  to  that:  so  now  every  quarrel  is  about  religion.  'Tis  pos- 
sible that  there  is  no  other  occasion  for  war  but  that."     (p.  125  ch., 

XXX.) 

These  letters  are  full  of  implacable  hatred  of  the  Jesuits: 

"  Your  letters  are  always  most  welcome  to  me,  as  being  full  of 
excellent  zeal  for  the  common  good  of  the  world,  which  is  a  rare 
thing  in  these  times,  when  the  Jesuits  have  done  all  that  is  possible 
to  establish  an  universal  debauchery  in  the  world."  (p.  134,  Letter 
xxxiii.) 

'^  1  heartily  thank  you  for  writing  into  England  for  a  De  modo 
agendi.  I  advise  Monsieur  Castrine  of  it,  who  is  getting  me  the 
Constitutions  of  the  Jesuits  copied  out,  in  order  to  the  sending  them 
hither.  I  long  to  see  them ;  for  surely  'tis  a  strange  thing  to  think 
how  close  they  keep  them  here  in  Italy.  'Tis  not  long  since  Gregory 
the  XlVth  made  a  brief  in  favor  of  them,  and  yet  I  cannot  for  my 
life  get  a  copy  of  it;  they  keep  their  secrets  so  unknown  to  the  world, 
and  you  will  excuse  me  if  I  make  no  difference  between  a  Spaniard 
and  a  Jesuit,  except  in  that  (wherein  I  agree  with  you)  that  I  take 
the  greatest  Spanish  rogue  in  the  ivhole  tvorld  to  be  a  better  man  than 
the  least-ivicked  Jesuit  that  is ;  for  a  Spaniard  hath  guts  in  his  brains, 
and  hath  a  capacity  of  learning  some  good,  if  he  be  but  taught  it; 
but  the  Jesuits  are  ail  Hint,  and  their  consciences  are  darkened,  and 
there  is  no  speaking  to  them  [unless  you  have  a  kingdom  to  em- 
broil, or  a  parliament  to  toss  up  into  the  air] . 

''  I  believe  there  never  was  a  race  of  men  that  zvere  such  sworn 
enemies  to  goodness  and  truth.  ^^    (p.  96.) 

I  could  multiply  these  passages  endlessly.  Father  Paul's  hfe  was 
attempted  by  an  assassin,  and  he  complains  of  the  plots  of  the  Jes- 
uits against  him  in  almost  every  other  letter.  But  space  does  not 
permit  of  further  illustration  on  this  point,  and  I  now  give  Father 
Paul's  account  of  the  end  of  Father  Fulgentio : 

'*  Father  Fulgentio  hath  preached  just  as  you  neard  him  do  two 
years  ago ;  he  has  met  with  great  opposition  from  this  nuncio,  who 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  77 

has  complained  of  him,  saying,  that  he  could  not  deny  hut  Ids 
doctrine  was  good  ;  but  nevertheless  he  was  not  bound  to  stay  till  the 
preacher  was  declared  a  heretic:  and  the  pope  making  a  complaint 
against  him,  has  said,  that  that  preaching  of  the  scriptures  is  a 
suspicious  thing;  and  he  that  keeps  so  close  to  the  scriptures  will 
ruin  the  Catholic  faith.      , 

''  The  audience  which  uses  to  be  at  his  sermons,  hath  been  very 
numerous  and  flourishing,  there  having  been  there  sometimes  six 
hundred  of  the  nobility:  he  has  still  gone  on  speaking  the  plain 
truth,  and  proving  it  by  the  Word  of  God,  without  reproving  any 
one  by  name  :  and  above  all,  it  has  been  his  way  to  reprove  that 
ignorance  which  is  for  pinning  men^s  faith  upon  other  men^s  sleeves, 
and  against  the  express  knowledge  of  every  one^s  duty. 

"  Now  there  cannot  be  a  more  mortal  offense  to  the  Jesuits  than 
this  is,  who  have  no  other  foundation  for  all  their  divinity  than  the 
public  ignorance,    (ch.  xxiv.  p.  106.) 

"  Father  Fulgentio  hath  done  as  became  a  true  Catholic  preacher ; 
he  has  preacbed  the  gospel  of  Christ  our  Lord,  forbearing  to  person- 
ate anyone  whatsoever :  be  hath  dissatisfied  Rome  and  her  adherents, 
because  it  is  impossible  to  please  them  any  other  ways,  but  by 
preaching  them  and  leaving  Christ  out. 

"  The  Pope's  last  words  of  him  were,  that  he  has  indeed  made  some 
good  sermons,  but  bad  ones  ivithal ;  that  he  stands  too  much  upon 
scripture,  which  is  a  book  (quoth  he)  that  if  any  man  will  keep  close 
to,  he  will  quite  ruin  the  Catholic  faith.  Which  words  of  his  have 
not  been  very  well  liked  of  here:  but  I,  for  my  part,  commend 
them,  and  hold  them  true;  because  there  he  pulls  in  his  tail  and 
shews  where  he  builds  his  greatness  "  (ch.  iv.  p.  112.) 

Father  Fulgentio  at  last  was  seized  and  brought  before  the 
Inquisition.    Father  Paul  writes : 

*'  As  for  Friar  Fulgentio,  'tis  not  true  that  he  is  put  into  the 
galleys;  nor  have  we  any  certainty  of  him  further,  since  he  was 
clapt  up  in  the  Inquisition  prison.  A  month  ago  the  fathers  of  his 
order  wrote  from  Rome  that  he  was  hanged  in  prison  and  so  they 
believe  for  certain,  but  I  have  no  other  proof  of  it.''  (p.  172,  Letter 
xlvi.) 

Alas !  It  was  all  too  true,  and  this  is  Father  Paul's  description  of 
the  end  of  his  friend  : 

"  I  dare  say  you  have  a  great  mind  to  know  the  truth  of  the  miser- 
able end  of  Friar  Fulgentio,  because  you  knew  him,  and  that  you 
are  the  more  willing  to  know  it,  because  it  has  been  told  divers 
ways. 

"  I  myself  do  not  as  yet  know  the  whole  of  it  certainly;  and  I  am 
very  cautious  in  believing,  where  I  have  not  good  grounds  for  it. 
Wherefore  the  narrative  that  I  shall  give  you,  shall  be  nothing  but 
truth,  though  it  be  not  the  whole  truth. 

"  Father  Fulgentio  went  away,  as  yourself  know,  in  the  beginning 


78  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

of  August,  1608,  with  a  most  ample  patent  of  safe  conduct,  and  a 
particular  clause  in  it  that  nothing  should  be  done  against  his 
honor.  Being  got  to  Rome,  they  tampered  with  him  to  abjure,  and 
do  public  penance;  but  he  still  denied  it  most  resolutely,  referring 
himself  to  his  safe  conduct.  At  last,  persisting  in  the  negative  of 
doing  public  penance,  he  was  wrought  upon  to  make  a  very  secret 
abjuration  before  a  notary  and  two  witnesses,  by  the  new  declaration 
of  the  cardinals  that  it  should  be  understood  as  done  without  any 
dishonor,  and  without  any  prejudice  to  him. 

''  Matters  passed  on  with  him  sometimes  well,  sometimes  ill, 
according  as  he  was  look'd  on,  till  February  last,  and  then  one 
evening  Cardinal  Pamphilio,  the  Pope's  vicar,  sent  some  Serjeants 
to  apprehend  him,  pretending  that  he  had  done  something,  I  know 
not  what,  that  did  belong  to  his  office;  they  put  him  in  prison  in  the 
tower  of  Nona,  where  men  of  ordinary  offenses  are  thrust. 

"  Then  they  went  to  seize  upon  his  papers;  and  having  looked 
into  them,  they  removed  him  from  that  prison  to  the  Inquisition  jail; 
there  they  drew  up  three  charges  against  him.  One,  that  he  had 
amongst  bis  books  some  prohibited  ones;  the  second,  that  he  kept 
correspondence  by  letters  with  the  heretics  of  England  and  Germany; 
the  third,  that  there  was  a  writing  all  of  his  own  hand,  which  con- 
tained divers  articles  against  the  Catholic  Roman  doctrine,  particu- 
larly that  St.  Peter  was  not  superior  to  the  other  apostles;  that  the 
pope  is  not  head  of  the  church ;  that  he  cannot  command  anything 
beyond  what  Christ  had  commanded;  that  the  council  of  Trent  was 
neither  a  general  council  nor  a  lawful  one;  that  there  are  many  her- 
esies in  the  Church  of  Rome,  and  a  great  many  such  things. 

"  To  these  charges  he  answered: 

*' 1.  As  to  the  books;  that  he  did  not  know  that  they  were 
prohibited. 

'^2.  As  to  the  commerce  of  letters  that  passed  between  him  and 
those  persons,  and  those  persons  and  him,  that  they  were  none  of 
them  declared  heretics. 

''  3.  As  to  the  writings  that  were  under  his  own  hand,  that  they 
were  imperfect,  and  that  they  were  not  his  opinions,  but  only  mem- 
orandums to  make  consideration  upon  those  points. 

*'  At  which  answers  of  his,  the  Inquisition  being  unsatisfied,  they 
resolved  to  proceed  against  bim  by  way  of  torture,  which  being 
intimated  to  him,  he  answered  that  he  (as  a  priest)  was  not  a 
person  to  be  put  to  torture;  but,  however,  they  might  do  as  they 
pleased,  for  he  put  himself  upon  tbeir  mercy. 

"  The  4th  of  July  he  was  brought  into  St.  Peter's,  where  there 
was  an  unspeakable  throng  of  people,  and  there,  being  placed  upon 
a  floor,  his  faults  were  rehearsed,  and  the  sentence  passed  upon  him 
that  he  should  be  excluded  from  the  bosom  of  the  holy  church,  as  a 
heretic  relapsed,  and  delivered  to  the  governor  of  Rome,  to  be 
chastised,  but  without  fetching  blood. 

'^  At  this  ceremony,  which  lasted  about  an  hour,  Father  Ful- 
gentio  stood- with  eyes  lifted  up  to  heaven,  and  never  spake  a  word. 
People  thought  that  he  had  a  gag  in  his  mouth.  The  ceremony 
being  over,  he  was  conducted  to  the  Church  of  St.  Saviour's,  in 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LlTEBATUHE.  79 

Lauro,  and  there  degraded,  and  next  morning  he  was  brought  to 
Campo  di  Fiore,  and  there  hanged  and  burnt." 

Thus  it  may  be  seen,  Father  Fulgentio's  martyrdom  was  a  repe- 
tition of  Giordano  Bruno's,  a  few  years  before — IGOO.  I  think  to 
the  reflective  reader,  the  fact  that  Lord  Bacon  was  in  correspond- 
ence with  men  of  this  type  abroad,  will  prove  a  potent  factor  to 
prove  Bacon,  was  active  on  the  Continent  for  the  cause  of  the 
Keformation,  and,  that  all  his  sympathies  and  energies  for  good,  were 
employed  secretly,  and  in  divers  subtle  ways,  to  encourage  the  Prot- 
estant church,  and  combat  the  Papacy.  In  the  picture  which  con- 
temporary literature  presents  us  of  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  and 
commencement  of  the  seventeenth  centuries,  we  have  just  such  a 
portrait,  as  is  presented  to  us  by  the  play  of  Hamlet.  That  is, 
Europe  was  a  "  tvor  Id  prison.  ^^  To  question  dogma  or  authority,  to 
scrutinize  the  church  too  closely,  as  Hamlet  does  Ophehn,  was  to 
biing  powers  to  bear  that  were  "  loosed  out  of  hell  "  Such  men  as 
Bruno,  Galileo,  Fulgeutio,  Campanella,  Yanini,  like  Prince  Hamlet, 
were  '*  dreadfully  attended,^''  and  like  him,  stood  helpless  and  alone, 
environed  with  enemies  and  spies,  set  in  order  to  catch  their  words 
and  pluck  out  the  heart  of  their  mystery,  even  as  liosenkrantz  and 
Guildenstern  go  about  to  recover  Hamlets. 

Like  Hamlet  they  were  born  to  set  the  times,  that  were,  "  out  of 
joint, "  right,  and  expose  wickedness.  Like  Hamlet,  they  were  in  a 
miserable  minority,  overshadowed,  watched  and  suspected  by  the 
enthroned  and  kingly  power  of  the  Papacy  or  Roman  Catholic 
church,  with  v/hose  monstrous  wickedness  and  usurpation  they  were 
at  deadly  war,  but  with  no  weapons  of  defense  save  mind  and  knowl- 
edge. The  irresolute  will  of  Hamlet's  was  theirs  also.  In  the  "  dis- 
tracted globe  "  of  the  world  of  that  period,  the  Reformation  stood 
like  an  accusing  angel,  detecting  the  crimes  of  the  Papacy,  denying 
its  right  to  its  usurped  throne,  and  bidding  for  its  place— as  the  heir 
with  the  true  right,  but  without  possession  and  without  power,  and 
accused  of  madness,  as  in  Hamlet's  case.  Prince  Hamlet  is  presented 
as  a  reformer,  as  a  genius  whose  pessimism  springs  out  of  a  profound 
recognition  of  the  evil  days  on  which  he  has  fallen,  and  whose  desire 
is  to  ''  tveed  the  rank  garden  "  of  the  world.  It  was  the  church  that 
was  the  "  breeder  of  sinners  ;^^  it  is  Ophelia  Hamlet  scrutinizes  with 
the  words,  **  Are  you  honest  f  "  The  entire  action  of  the  play 
revolves  to  a  large  extent  upon  Hamlet's  conduct  to  Ophelia.  It  is 
his  doubts  and  questioning  of  her  honesty,  that  set  the  kin,i>'  and  his 
myrmidons  to  watch  and  scrutinize  Hamlet's  conduct  and  words  in 


80  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

relationship  to  her.  Ophelia's  passive  obedience  to  her  Father 
Polonius,  is  a  perfect  reflection  of  the  passive  obedience  of  the 
Catholic  church  at  that  period,  to  infalhbility  and  dogma,  which 
latter,  like  Polonius,  was  nothing  but  "  words,  words,  tvords,^^  and 
already  in  its  dotage.  The  church  was  the  child  of  traditional 
authority  and  infallibility,  of  that  certainty  that  would  find  truth  out 
"  tJiough  it  were  hid  indeed  within  the  centre. "  Hamlet's  scrutiny  of 
Ophelia,  and  ironical  mockery  of  Polonius,  go  hand  in  hand 
together,  the  killing  of  the  latter  being  a  turning  point  in  the 
tragedy. 

In  a  note  of  Bacon's,  an  entry  is  to  be  found  (under  the  note  of  a 
query)  **  Of  men  to  be  made  beyond  seas?  If  so  inclined  f  "  I  think 
the  date  is  1G08.  It  is  a  plausible  inference  to  draw,  that  Father 
Fulgentio's  corresi)ondence  with  Bacon  was  one  of  the  results 
of  this  memorandum.  It  is  striking  to  find  Bacon  selecting 
for  his  friendship,  a  man  who  died  a  martyr's  death  in  the 
Protestant  cause  of  the  Eeformation.  But  anyone  acquainted  with 
Bacon's  intense  hatred  of  the  Romish  church  will  not  be  astonished. 
What  Duessa  is  to  the  Faerie  Queen  the  papal  power  was 
to  Bacon.  In  all  this  may  be  found  suggestive  hints  for  the 
founding  of  a  society  like  the  Kosicrucians,  whose  emblem,  a  rose, 
was  borrowed  from  the  rose  or  seal  of  Luther.  Much  doubt  has 
been  expressed  as  to  the  real  tenets  of  the  Roscicrucians.  But  one 
thing  is  certain,  they  were  a  deeply  rehgious  sect,  imbued  with 
socialistic  and  Utopian  dreams  of  bettering  and  reforming  society. 
They  aimed  in  the  far-ofl'  future  at  restoring  the  fallen  condition  of 
man  to  its  primeval  purity.  Their  doctrines  were  drawn  from  the 
Bible  chiefly,  and  based  upon  recondite  Hermetic  lore,  in  connection 
with  the  Gnosis.  They  were  not  mere  mystics,  but  men  who  under- 
stood thoroughly  the  secret  language  of  the  past.  They  believed  in 
cycles  of  time,  during  which  man  ascended  and  descended  from  a 
low^er  to  a  higher  state  and  again  reascended  to  his  former  condition. 
They  read  everything  symbolically.  The  fall  of  man  according  to 
their  views  was  not  a  particular  event,  but  a  declension  of  man 
from  comparative  purity  or  uprightness  of  living,  (complete 
reversal  of  the  first  intention,)  to  an  animal  or  sexual  life,  where 
the  passions,  appetites  and  affections  determine  individuality,  rather 
than  the  heart  and  intellect. 

All  this  is  to  be  found  reechoed  in  Bacon's  dialogue  of  a  IIoli^ 
War,  not  only  in  the  general  scope  and  purport  of  the  work,  but 
even  in  the  concluding  text.    His  Holi/  War  is  nothing  short  of  a 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  81 

suggestion  for  a  peaceable  crusade,  a  revival  of  the  spirit  of  the 
Knights  Templar,  for  the  freeing  of  the  church. 

''Now,  if  there  be  such  a  tacit  league  or  confederation,  sure  it  is 
not  idle;  it  is  against  somewhat  or  somebody.  Who  should  they 
be?  Is  it  against  Wild  Beasts?  Or  the  elements  of  Fire  and 
Water?  No,  it  is  against  such  routs  and  shoals  of  people  as  have 
utterly,  degenerated  froyn  the  laws  of  Nature.  As  have  in  their  very 
body  and  frame  of  estate  a  monstrosity.  And  may  be  truly  counted 
(according  to  the  examples  we  have  formerly  recited)  common  enemies 
and  grievances  of  mankind,  or  disgraces  and  reproaches  to  human 
Nature.''^    {Holy  War.) 

Bacon's  religious  predilections  are  not  only  loudly  proclaimed  by 
his  Confessions  of  Faith,  his  Translation  of  the  Psalms,  and  his 
explication  of  thirty-four  of  the  Parables  of  Solomon,  but  are  far 
more  suggestive  when  studied  by  tbe  light  of  his  friendships.  I 
allude  to  Archbishop  Tenisou,  who  edited  his  Remains;  Herbert 
the  Poet,  to  whom  he  intrusted  some  literary  executorship;  the 
martyr,  Father  Fulgentio;  his  letters  to  the  Bishop  of  Lincoln,  etc. 
The  entire  style  of  Bacon's  literary  works  is  highly  colored  by 
divinity. 


CHAPTER  IV. 
Pan,   Dionysus  or   Bacchus,  and  Perseus  (Bacon's  three 

FABLES  ILLUSTRATING  PARABOLICAL  POESY  AND  STAGE  PLAYS 
IN  THE  "  DE  AUGMENTIS"). 

Silenus  —  old  drunken  Silenus  — 

On  his  ass,  with  his  paunch  full  of  wine, 
Comes,  folio w'd  by  crowds  of  Bacchantes, 

"With  their  brows  all  braided  with  vine ! 
Evohe  !  Evohe !  Zagreus !  They  rend 

With  their  shouts  the  light  air, 
And  Bacchus,  led  slow  on  a  leopard, 

Sweeps  by  with  his  ivy-bound  hair  ! 

The  fact  Bacon  introduces;  in  context  with  the  subject  of  stage 
plays  and  parabohcal  poesy,  in  his  De  Augmentis  (book  ii.),  the 
fables  of  Pan  and  Dionysus  (or  Bacchus)  ought  to  constitute  a 
sufficiently  profound  hint  for  the  theatre,  if  properly  understood  at 
all.  Dionysus  or  Bacchus  was  god  of  comedy  and  tragedy,  in 
short,  he  was  the  classical  protagonist  of  the  drama,  and  Pan 
always  followed  in  his  train.     Let  me  quote  Lucian  on  this  point : 

"  Bacchus,  the  general  of  this  spruce  band,  had  ram's  horns,  a 
circlet  of  vine  leaves  and  grapes  round  his  temples,  and  the  hair 
plaited  in  tresse's  like  a  woman's  coiffure,  and  rode  in  a  car  drawn  by 
leopards.  Under  him  were  two  other  commanders,  one  a  short, 
thick,  old,  shriveled  fellow,  with  a  pendulous  paunch,  a  flat,  apish 
nose,  and  long  pointed  ears,  mounted  generally  on  an  ass.  The 
other,  a  most  grotesque  figure,  his  lower  half  resembhng  a  goat, 
with  shaggy  haired  thighs,  a  long  goat's  beard,  just  the  same  horns, 
and  of  a  very  warm  temperament.  In  one  hand  he  held  a  pipe  of 
reeds,  in  the  other  a  crooked  stick;  and  so  he  hopped  and  frisked 
and  skipped  about  in  great  leaps  among  the  whole  troop,  and 
frightened  the  women,  who,  at  the  sight  of  him,  ran  up  and  down 
with  disheveled  hair,  crying,  '  Evohe,  Evohe,'  which,  I  suppose,  was 
the  name  of  their  commander-in-chief."  (pp.  781-782,  vol.  i. 
Lucian^ s  Works,  translated  by  Wm.  Tooke,  1820.) 

These  three  are,  of  course,  Bacchus,  Silenus  and  Pan,  who 
Lucian  presently  designates  by  their  real  names.  Pan,  in  short, 
was  part  of  the  equipage  of  Bacchus  or  Dionysus.     I  think,  to  the 

82 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUME.  83 

reflective  student,  the  fact  Bacon  introduces  the  fables  of  Pan, 
Perseus  and  Dionysus  altogether  in  his  De  Augmentis,  as  examples 
of  parabolical  poetry,  on  the  direct  heels  of  his  description  of  Stage 
Plays  (p.  107),  is  a  tremendous  and  overpowering  finger-post  for 
the  Theatre. 

PAN. 

Pan  was  called  by  the  Arcadians  the  Lord  of  Matter  {rov  rtji 
vXr/?  Hvpiov,M.acYoh.^Sit.l,  c.  22);  which  title  is  expressed  in  the  Latin 
name  Sylvanus,  Sylva,  and  vAt;  being  the  same  word,  written 
according  to  the  different  modes  of  pronouncing  different  dialects. 
In  a  choral  ode  of  Sophocles,  he  is  addressed  by  the  title  of 
author  and  director  of  the  dances  of  the  gods,  as  being  the  author 
and  disposer  of  the  regular  motion  of  the  universe.  According  to 
Pindar,  this  Arcadian  Pan  was  the  associate  or  husband  of  Rhea,  or 
Matter  (Schol,  in  Pind.  Pyth.  iii.  138).  It  was  his  music  of  the  Syrinx 
or  seven  reeded  pipe,  which,  like  Orpheus'  harp,  ordered  everything 
harmoniously.  Pan  was  the  principle  'of  universal  creative  order, 
and  the  Cnossian  dances  sacred  to  Jupiter,  and  the  Nyssian  to 
Bacchus,  were  under  the  directiou  of  Pan.  (Payne  Knight's  Sym- 
holical  Language  of  Ancient  Art  and  Mythology,  186,  187.) 

Macrobius  describes  him:  "  Universae  substantise  materialis 
dominatorem  significari  volentes.  Cujus  materise  vis  universorum 
corporum,  sen  ilia  divina  sen  terrena  sint,  componit  essentiam.'^ 
(p.  214  Saturnalia,  lib.  i.) 

We  may  guess  one  of  Bacon's  objects  in  introducing  him,  in  con- 
text, or  sequence,  to  stage  plays  and  parabolical  poetry.  For  he 
was  the  minister  and  companion  of  Bacchus  or  Dionysus,  the  god  of 
tragic  art  and  protector  of  theatres,  whom  Bacon  introduces  on  the 
heels  of  this  fable  of  Pan,  in  his  De  Augmentis.  Sacrifices  were 
offered  to  him  in  common  with  Dionysus.  He  instructed  Daphnis  in 
the  use  of  the  Syrinx  (Virgil  Eclog.  i.  32,  iv.  58).  The  student  may 
well  note  here  that  one  of  Lord  Bacon's  Deficients  of  a  new  world  of 
sciences,  in  his  De  Augmentis,  is  entitled  Venatio  Panis,  the  hun- 
ting of  Pan,  or  Literate  Experience,  and  is  allied  to  his  induct- 
ive method  and  has  nothing  to  do  with  nature,  but  only  literature. 

The  hints  Bacon  gives  us  in  his  De  Augmentis  for  the  theatre  and 
plays  are  so  frequent  and  pointed,  that  it  seems,  indeed,  as  if 
nothing  but  willful  blindness,  or  prejudiced  stupidity,  prevented  our 
seizing  them.  For  example,  at  the  termination  of  the  fable  of 
Dionysus  (the  protagonist  of  the  classical  drama,  please  mark,) 
Bacon  writes : 


84  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

''  Lastly,  that  confusion  of  the  persons  of  Jupiter  and  Bacchus 
may  be  well  transferred  to  a  parable  ;  seeing  noble  and  famous  acts, 
and  remarkable  and  glorious  merits  do  sometimes  j^roceed  from 
virtue  and  well-ordered  reason  and  magnanimity,  and  sometimes 
from  a  hidden  affection  and  a  hidden  passion ;  howsoever  both  the 
one  and  the  other  so  affect  the  renown  of  fame  and  glory,  that  a 
man  can  hardly  distinguish  between  the  acts  of  Bacchus  and  the 
gests  of  Jupiter. 

"  But  we  stay  too  long  in  the  theatre  ;  let  us  now  pass  on  to  the 
palace  of  the  mind."  (p.  130,  book  ii.;  Advancement  of  Learning, 
1640.) 

By  gests  {gesta)  Bacon  undoubtedly  hints  at  plays.  Is  it  not 
somewhat  remarkable  to  find,  the  first  tidings  of  the  earliest  acting 
of  the  supposed  Shakespeare  plays,  connected  with  Gray^s  Inn  and 
reprinted  in  1688  under  the  title  of  Gesta  Grayorum  f 

'^  In  1594,"  writes  Hallewell  Phillips,  "  there  were  rare  doings  at 
Gray's  Inn  in  the  Christmas  holidays  of  1594. " 

Bacon,  moreover,  in  writing  of  the  Acts  of  Bacchus,  is  undoubtedly 
alluding  to  Action  and  the  Theatre.  For  tragedy  and  comedy  arise 
out  of  the  acts  of  Bacchus ;  that  is,  out  of  the  action  of  the  affections, 
passions  and  appetites  (with  each  other),  of  which  latter  he  was  the 
representative.  Bacchus  is  an  emblem  of  passionate  life,  of  which 
the  vine,  or  wine,  its  juice,  is  the  emblem.  Noise,  riot,  joy,  laugh- 
ter, all  follow  in  his  train,  and  it  may  be  well  noticed  Bacon  has 
evidently  drawn  a  subtle  distinction  between  the  characters  of 
Bacchus  and  Jupiter. 

Bacon  gives  us  in  his  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients,  a  sketch  of 
this  Dionysus,  or  Bacchus,  with  explanations.  Now,  I  think  there  is 
sufficient  in  this  fable  of  Bacon's,  alone  to  prove  he  clearly  appre- 
hended the  ethical  character  of  the  meaning  attached  to  Bacchus, 
as  lying  at  the  bottom  of  tragedy  and  comedy;  that  is,  as  the  action 
of  passion  and  affections  against  each  other.     He  writes  : 

"  This  fable  seems  to  contain  a  little  system  of  morality,  so  that 
there  is  scarce  any  better  invention  in  all  ethics.  Under  the 
history  of  Bacchus  is  drawn  the  nature  of  unlawful  desire  or  affec- 
tion and  disorder  ;  for  the  appetite  and  thirst  of  apparent  good  is 
the  mother  of  all  unlawful  desire,  though  ever  so  destructive;  and 
all  unlawful  desires  are  conceived  in  unlawful  wishes  or  requests, 
rashly  indulged  or  granted  before  they  are  well  understood  or  con- 
sidered "    ( Wisdom  of  the  Ancients,  XXIV.) 

Now,  mark  Bacon  in  his  seventh  book  (treating  of  Morality 
or  Ethic)  of  De  Augmentis  declares  the  poets  and  historians  to  be 
the  best  doctors  of  this  knowledge,  that  is,  of  Ethic.    Bacchus  from 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  85 

the  citation,  is  clearly  apprehended  as  ^^  apparent  (7006Z,"that  is, 
pleasure  of  the  body,  and  of  the  moment,  ungoverned  by  judgment 
or  understanding.  Bacon  evidsntly  intends  to  imply  that  it  is  the 
yielding  to  Bacchus,  as  the  temptation  of  the  moment  (the  good  of 
the  senses),  which  is  the  mother  of  all  unlawful  desire.  These  two 
are,  then,  *'  Reason  and  Will, "  which  elsewhere  he  says,  ''  turn 
faces.''''  (p.  218,  Lib.  v.,  Advancement  of  Learning.)  Bacon  con- 
tinues : 

"  That  Bacchus  should  be  the  inventor  of  wine,  carries  a  fine 
allegory  with  it;  for  every  affection  is  cunning  and  subtle  in  discover- 
ing a  proper  matter  to  nourish  and  feed  it ;  and  of  all  things  known  to 
mortals,  wine  is  the  most  powerful  and  effectual  for  exciting  and 
inflaming  passions  of  all  kinds,  and  being  indeed  like  a  common  fuel 
to  all."     (lb.) 

Of  the  Ivy,  he  writes :  *'  Nor  is  it  without  a  mystery  that  the  ivy 
was  sacred  to  Bacchus,  and  this  is  for  two  reasons :  first,  because  ivy 
is  an  evergreen,  or  flourishes  in  the  winter ;  and,  secondly,  because 
it  winds  and  creeps  about  so  many  things,  as  trees,  walls,  and  raises 
itself  above  them.  As  to  the  first,  every  passion  grows  fresh,  strong 
and  vigorous  by  opposition  and  prohibition,  as  it  were,  by  a  kind  of 
contrast  or  antiperistasis,  like  the  ivy  in  winter ;  and  for  the  second, 
the  predominant  passion  of  the  mind  throws  itself,  like  the  ivy, 
round  all  human  actions,  entwines  all  our  resolutions  and  perpetu- 
ally adheres  to,  and  mixes  itself  among,  or  even  overtops  them.'' 
(lb.) 

These  two  similes  find  their  exact  parallels  in  the  plays ;  in  the 
Comedy  of  Errors  wo  find  Adriana  exclaiming  : 

Thou  art  an  elm,  my  husband,  I  a  vine, 
Whose  weakness  married  to  thy  stronger  state 
Makes  me  with  thy  strength  to  communicate. 

(Act  ii.  sc.  2.) 

Vines  were  always  trained  in  Italy  upon  elm  trees.  In  the  Mid- 
summer Nighfs  Dream,  we  read  of  Bottom  : 

Titania.     Sleep,  thou,  and  I  will  "wind  thee  in  my  arms. 
Fairies  be  gone,  and  be  always  away. 
So  doth  the  woodbine  the  sweet  honeysuckle 
Gently  entwist ;    the  female  ivy  so 
Enrings  the  barky  fingers  of  the  elm. 

(Act  iv.  sc.  1.) 

The  Latin  word  for  vice  was  vitium,  borrowed  from  vitis,  the 
vine,  from  the  emblem  of  wine  and  its  parasitical  effect  upon  the  soul 
and  body,  that  is  a  symbol  of  passion.  Adriana  is  pictured  as  unbridled 
will  in  direct  contrast  to  her  sister  Luciana.  We  shall  see,  how  Bacon 
has  worked  out  the  Comedy  of  Errors,  in  harmony  with  his  fable  of 


86  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

the  "  Syrens  or  pleasures,"  in  our  next  chapter.  Symbols  borrowed 
from  vine  dressing  and  agriculture,  were  applied  ethically  in  the 
Mysteries,  as  we  may  gather  from  Cicero  : 

"  Those  things,  too,  which  the  earth  produces  have  a  sort  of 
gradual  growth  toward  perfection,  not  very  unlike  what  we  see  in 
animals.  Therefore  we  say  that  a  vine  lives,  and  dies;  w^e  speak  of  a 
tree  as  young,  or  old ;  being  in  its  prime,  or  growing  old.  And  it  is 
therefore  not  inconsistent  to  speak,  as  in  the  case  of  animals,  of  some 
things  in  plants,  too,  being  conformable  to  nature,  and  some  not; 
and  to  say  that  there  is  a  certain  cultivation  of  them,  nourishing, 
and  causing  them  to  grow,  which  is  the  science  and  art  of  the  farmer, 
which  prunes  them,  cuts  them  in,  raises  them,  trains  them,  props 
them,  so  that  they  may  be  able  to  extend  themselves  in  thedirection 
which  nature  points  out;  in  such  a  manner  that  the  vines  themselves, 
if  they  could  speak,  would  confess  that  they  ought  to  be  managed 
and  protected  in  the  way  they  are.  And  now  indeed  that  which 
protects  it  (that  I  may  continue  to  speak  chiefly  of  the  vine)  is 
external  to  the  vine :  for  it  has  but  very  little  power  in  itself  to  keep 
itself  in  the  best  possible  condition,  unless  cultivation  is  applied  to 
it.  But  if  sense  were  added  to  the  vine,  so  that  it  could  feel  desire 
and  be  moved  by  itself,  what  do  you  think  it  would  do  ?  Would  it 
do  those  things  which  were  formerly  done  to  it  by  the  vine-dresser, 
and  of  itself  attend  to  itself?     ( Chief  Good  and  Evil.) 

The  student  may  perceive  Cicero  is  hinting  at  the  culture  of  self, 
and  pruning  of  vices,  which  he  applies  by  the  simile  of  vine-dress- 
ing. Cicero  had  been  initiated  in  the  Mysteries,  and  it  is  highly 
probable  this  metaphor,  which  he  introduces  again  and  again,  was 
borrowed  from  what  he  had  gathered  in  the  rites,  which,  mark,  were 
Bacchic,  that  is  the  tutelary  deities  were  Ceres  and  Bacchus,  the 
goddess  and  god  of  Agriculture.  Indeed  the  Georgics  of  Virgil 
which  treat  of  the  dressing  of  the  vine,  the  tillage  of  the  earth  and 
the  culture  of  trees  (in  short,  agriculture),  open  with  an  invocation  to 
Ceres  and  Bachus,  as  the  guardians  of  these  rustic  arts : 

"  Quid  faciat  laetas  segetes,  quo  sidere  tei-ram 
Vertere,  Maecenas,  ulmisque  adjungere  vites 
Conveniat,  quae  cura  boum,  qui  cultus  habendo 
Sit  pecori,  apibus  quanta  experientia  parcis, 
Hinc  canere  incipiam.    Vos,  o  clarissima  mundi 
Lumina,  labentem  coelo  quae  ducitis  annum ; 
Liber  et  alma  Ceres,  vestro  si  munere  tellus 
Chaoniam  pingui  glandem  mutavit  arista, 
Poculaque  inventis  Acheloia  miscuit  uvis ; 
Et  vos,  agrestum  praesentia  numina,  Fauni, 
Ferte  simul  Faunique  pedem  Dryadesque  puellae  : 
Munera  vestra  cano. "    ( Georgic  I. ) 

Now,  is  it  not  indeed  striking  and  convincing,  to  find  Bacon  entit- 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEIiATUME.  87 

ling  his  system  of  morality,  or  ethic,  treating  of  character,  as  The 
Georgics  of  the  Mind,  which  title  he  gives  in  capitals,  and  makes  it 
one  of  his  Deficients  of  a  New  World  of  Sciences  ?  The  origin  of  comedy 
and  tragedy  arose  around  agriculture,  and  the  chief  or  centre  myth 
of  the  Mysteries  was  the  story  of  Demeter  (Ceres)  and  Proserpine, 
as  an  allegory  of  summer  and  winter.  Bacon  writes  in  the  Two 
Books  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning  : 

'^  Neither  needed  men  of  so  excellent  parts  to  have  despaired  of 
a  fortune  (which  the  poet  Virgil  promised  himself,  and  indeed 
obtained),  who  got  as  much  glory  of  eloquence,  wit,  and  learning 
in  the  expressions  of  the  observations  of  husbandry,  as  of  the 
heroical  acts  of  ^neas.  And  surely,  if  the  purpose  be  in  good 
earnest  not  to  write  at  leisure,  that  which  men  may  read  at  leisure, 
but,  really,  to  instruct  and  suborn  Action  and  active  life,  tbese 
Georgics  of  the  Mind,  concerning  the  husbandry  and  tillage  thereof, 
are  no  less  worthy  the  heroical  descriptions  of  virtue,  duty  and 
felicity,  wherefore  the  main  and  primitive  division  (of  moral 
knowledge),  seemeth  to  be  into  the  exemplar  or  platform  of  good, 
and  the  regiment  or  culture  of  the  mind;  the  one  describing  the 
nature  of  good,  the  other  prescribing  rules  how  to  subdue,  apply 
and  accommodate  the  will  of  man  thereunto."  (Book  ii.  Advance- 
ment of  Learning,  1605.) 

Mark  how  Bacon  writes,  ''  really  to  instruct  and  suborn  action ;  " 
that  is,  to  make  use  of  action  in  lively  representation  or  plays, 
so  as  to  enforce  his  ethics  as  Georgics  of  the  Mind.  The  student  of 
Shakespeare  (save  the  mark!)  must  have  noticed  the  enormous 
amount  of  agricultural  metaphors,  or  similes,  introduced  into  the 
text  in  connection  with  character  f 

*'  Dionysus  was  regarded  as  the  patron  of  the  drama,  and  at  the 
state  festival  of  the  Dionysia,  which  was  celebrated  with  great 
pomp  in  the  city  of  Athens,  dramatic  entertainments  took  place  in 
his  honor,  for  which  all  the  renowned  Greek  dramatists  of  antiquity 
composed  their  immortal  tragedies  and  comedies. "  (p.  130,  Myths 
and  Legends  of  Ancient  Greece  and  Borne.    E.  Besens,  1879.  )i 

"  The  Greek  drama,  as  is  well  known,  owed  its  origin  to  the 
dithyrambic  choruses  in  the  festivals  of  Dionysus,  who  was,  in  fact, 
the  patron-god  of  the  stage ;  the  theatre  at  Athens  was  the  theatre 
of  Dionysus;  his  altar  stood  in  the  center  of  the  orchestra;  the 
middle  stall  in  the  foremost  row  of  reserved  seats  was  assigned  to 
tlie  priest  of  that  god,  and  is  still  to  be  seen  carved  with  the  inscrip- 
tion, IEPEn:S  JIONT^Or  EAETGEPEn^.^'  {The  BacchcB  of 
Euripides,  byT.  E.  Sandys,  Introd.  p.  xxii.) 

1  Lord  Bacon  introduces  the  story  of  Pentheus  in  his  fable  of  Dionysus  (in  his 
De  Avgmentis),  I  am  convinced,  with  the  object  of  suggesting  the  drama,  for  there 
was  a  trilogy  of  J^schylus  on  the  doom  of  Pentheus.  "To  Thespis  himself  is 
attributed  a  play  called  the  Pentheus.'^  (Heraclides  Ponticus,  Diogenes  Laertius  v. 
$  92,  referred  to  by  Wecklein.) 


88  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE. 

The  Anthesteria,  or  flower  gathering  festival,  was  another  great 
Bacchic  institution,  connected  closely  with  Proserpine  and  the  drama, 
as  the  revival  of  the  dead  and  sleeping  earth  after  winter.  Surely 
in  the  flower  gathering  scene  in  The  Winters  Tale  we  may  rediscover 
all  this? 

The  reader  will  find  Euripides  connecting  Orpheus  with  the 
Bacchanalian  orgies  in  Hippolytus,  953.  It  is  very  striking  to  find 
Bacon  frequently  quoting  and  alluding  to  Euripides  in  his  marginal 
notes  upon  the  fable  of  Dionysus.  Twice  he  refers  the  reader  to  the 
Bacchse  of  Euripides.  And  here  I  should  like  to  observe,  critics 
constantly  object  that  Lord  Bacon's  philosophical  turn  of  mind  was 
quite  contrary  to  poetry  or  dramatic  inspiration.  To  this  we  reply 
by  the  striking  parallel  afforded  by  Euripides,  who  devoted  himself 
to  philosophy,  studying  physics  under  Anaxagoras.  Athenaeus  states 
Euripides  committed  to  memory  certain  treatises  of  Heraclitus, 
which  he  found  hidden  in  the  temple  of  Artemis,  and  which  he 
brought  to  the  notice  of  Socrates.  (Athen.  i.,  p.  3  a ;  Tatian,  Or.  c. 
Graec,  p.  143  b;  Harling,  Eur.  Kest.,  p.  131.)  Traces  of  the  teach- 
ing of  Anaxagoras  have  been  remarked  in  many  passages  of  the 
existing  plays,  and  especially  in  Alcestis  (v.  925  etc.;  comp.  Cic.  Tusc. 
Disp.  iii.  14).  Miilleris  so  much  impressed  with  this  anomaly  of  philos- 
opher turned  dramatist  that  he  writes :  "  We  do  not  know  what 
induced,  a  person  with  such  tendencies,  to  devote  himself  to  tragic 
poetry.''^  {Greek  Literature,  p.  358.)  Plato  in  Protagoras  gives  the 
key  to  his  anomaly : 

"  The  art  of  a  sophist  or  sage  is  ancient,  but  the  men  who  proposed 
it  in  ancient  times,  fearing  tlie  odium  attached  to  it,  sought  to  con- 
ceal it,  and  veiled  it  over  under  the  garb  of  poetry,  as  Homer, 
Hesiod,  Simonides,  and  others,  under  that  of  the  Mysteries,  such  as 
Orpheus,  Musseus  and  their  followers."  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  in  his 
Defence  of  Poesie  "  maintains,  that  the  old  philosophers  dis- 
guised or  embodied  their  entire  cosmogonies  in  their  poetry,  as,  for 
example,  Thales,  Empedocles,  Parmenides,  Pythagoras  and  Phocy- 
clides,  who  were  poets  and  philosophers  at  once. '' 

In  Bacon's  Sylva  Sylvarum  of  1658  (the  seventh  edition),  there 
are  a  great  number  of  water-marks  to  be  seen,  if  the  pages  are 
held  up  to  the  light.  There  is  one  evidently  intended  for  a  bunch 
of  grapes,  and  it  may  be  found  frequently  repeated  at  intervals  of 
pages.  It  sometimes  consists  of  exactly  thirty -five  grapes  with  a  stalk. 
This  is  remarkable,  because  the  catalogue  of  the  1623  Folio  plays  con- 
tains thirty-five  plays,  and  grapes,  (as  the  emblem  of  the  god  of  the 
vine,  Bacchus),  are  symbolical  of  the  Drama  or  Theatre.  Donaldson 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  89 

in  ]]is  Greek  Theatre,  points  out  how  the  drama  arose  with  the  Vin- 
tage SONGS.  The  reader  will  find  a  great  number  of  repro- 
ductions of  these  grape  water-marks  upon  plates  XI,  XII,  XIII, 
.(numbers  4,  16,  31,  39,  40,  41,  42,  45,  49,  50,  68),  in 'Mrs.  Henry 
Potts'  interesting  work,  Francis  Bacon  and  Ms  Secret  Society, 
1891,  Francis  Schulte,  Chicago.  In  Bacon's  description  of  Bacchus 
(Dionysus),  in  his  De  Augmentis,  he  writes:  "  He  invented  the 
planting  and  dressing  of  vines;  the  making  and  use  of  wine. " 

The  same  mind  may  be  refound  associating  Bacchus  with  the 
vine  and  the  grape  in  this  passage : 

Come  thou  monarch  of  the  vine, 
Plumpy  Bacchus  with  pink  eyne  : 
In  thy  vats  our  cares  be  drown'd. 
With  thy  grapes  our  hairs  be  crown'd. 

(Anthony  and  Cleopatra.) 

I  think  it  is  very  possible  Bacon  is  alluding  to  these  water-marks 
when  he  writes : 

"  The  Turks  have  r  pretty  art  of  chamoletting  of  paper.  They 
take  divers  oiled  colors,  and  put  them  severally  (in  drops)  upon  water, 
and  stir  the  water  lightly,  and  then  wet  their  paper  (being  of  some 
thickness)  with  it ;  and  the  paper  will  be  waved  and  veined,  like 
chamolet  or  marble."     {Sylva  Sylvarum.)     (Exp.  741.) 

In  Bacon's  "  Literate  Experience  "  {Experientia  Liter ata),  in  the 
De  Augmentis,  (1623  its  translation  of  1640),  this  experiment  of 
chamoletted  paper  is  introduced  as  an  example,  page  227.  This 
proves  conclusively  Bacon  refers  this  experiment,  as  also  the  ones 
upon  grafting  of  elms  and  roses,  to  a  book  (or  Literate  experience), 
and  not  to  nature  at  all.  Bacon  seems  to  hint  at  water-marks, 
for  the  very  name  "water-mark,"  is  derived  from  the  waved 
(as  he  writes)  appearance  of  paper  so  treated,  like  watered  silk. 

In  Bacon's  New  Atlantis  we  read: 

"  The  Tirsan  doth  also  then  ever  choose  one  man  from  amongst 
his  sons  to  live  in  house  with  him,  who  is  called  ever  after  the  Son 
of  the  Vine.  The  reason  will  hereafter  appear.  On  the  feast  day 
the  father,  or  Tirsan,  cometh  forth  after  divine  service  into  a  large 
room  where  the  feast  is  celebrated;  which  room  hath  an  half  pace  at 
the  upper  end.  Against  the  wall  in  the  middle  of  the  Half  Pace,  is 
a  chair  placed  for  him,  with  a  table  and  carpet  before  it.  Over  the 
chair  is  a  state  made  round  or  oval,  and  it  is  of  Ivy  ;  and  Ivy 
somewhat  whiter  than  ours,  like  the  leaf  of  a  silver  aspe  ;  for  it  is 
green  all  winter.  And  the  state  is  curiously  wrought  with  silver  and 
silk  of  divers  colours,  broiding  or  binding  in  the  Ivy;  and  is  ever  of 
the  work  of  some  of  the  daughters  of  the  family.  And  veiled  over 
at  the  top  with  a  fine  net  of  silk  and  silver,  hut  the  substance  of  it  is 


90  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

TRUE  IVT,  whereof,  after  it  is  taken  down,  the  friends  of  the  family 
are  desirous  to  have  some  leaf  or  sprig  to  keep."  (page  19,  mis- 
paged  27,  yil.  edition,  Sylva  Sylvarum,  1658.) 

The  reader  will  observe  the  vine  and  ivy,  the  two  plants 
SACRED  TO  Bacchus,  here  introduced  toqether.  In  Bacon's 
fable  of  Dionysus,  or  Bacchus,  which  he  introduces  (mark)  twice, 
first  in  the  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients ,  and  again  in  his  De  Augmentis 
(Book  ii.),  to  illustrate  philosophy  according  to  parabolical  poetry 
or  stage  plays,  he  writes : 

"  The  invention  of  the  vine  is  a  wise  parable,  for  every  affection 
is  very  quick  and  witty  in  finding  out  that  which  nourisheth  and 
cherishes  it,  and  of  all  things  known  to  men,  wine  is  the  most 
powerful  and  efficacious  to  excite  and  inflame  passions,  of  what  kind 
soever.''     (p.  128.) 

'^  Neither  is  it  without  a  mystery,  that  the  ivy  was  sacred  to 
Bacchus ;  the  application  holds  two^  ways :  First,  in  that  the  Ivy 
remains  green  in  winter.'^    (p.  121) 

Here  are  the  same  words  as  cited  from  the  New  Atlantis.  I 
must  therefore  quote  from  Virgil  and  his  commentators,  to  show 
this  is  classically  exact. 

Virgil  in  his  seventh  eclogue  writes  of  the  poet's  ivy  crown : 

''"Pastores,  hedera  crescentem  ornate  poetam, 
Arcades,  invidia  rumpantur  ut  ilia  Codro ; 
Aut,  si  ultra  placitum  laudarit,  baccare  frontem 
Cingite,  ne  vati  noceat  mala  lingua  futuro. "    (25-28.) 

Vossius  remarks  on  this : 

*'  Pastores  genere  Arcadico  (v.  4)  cantus  ex  hominibus  agricolis 
peritissimi  hederam,  prsemia,  quod  Horatius  dicit,  doctarum  frontium 
Bacchicum  istum  honorem  (iii.  39,  iv.  10)  qui  in  vates  tantum  altis- 
simorum,  spirituum  cadit  incipienti  poetae  non  tantum  decernere,  sed 
ipsi  circum  tempora  hgare  jubenter."     (p.  80,  Ecloga,  vii.  25-28.) 

"  Baccho  sive  laccho  praeter  vitem  Jiedera  quoque  sacra  erat."  (p. 
93,  Ecloga,  vii.  61-64),  viz.:  — 

The  ivy  was  also  sacred  to  Bacchus,  besides  the  vine. 

In  Eclogue  viii. : 

'^  En  erit,  ut  liceat  totum  mihi  ferre  per  orbem 
Sola  Sophocleo  tua  carmina  digna  cothurno  ? 
A  te  principium  j  tibi  desinet :  accipejussis 
Carmina  coepta  tuis,  atque  banc  sine  tempora  circum. 
Inter  victricis  hederam  tibi  serpere  laurus.     (10-13.) 

Poets  were  crowned  with  the  ivy.  Liber  or  Bacchus  was  the 
father  of  song  and  Apollo  the  god.  Ennius,  Horace  and  Varro 
each  say,  poets  were  crowned  with  ivy.  Upon  the  same  pages  of 
the  New  Atlantis ^  already  cited,  we  read: 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  91 

^'  The  young  lads  whereof  one  carrieth  a  scrowl  of  their  shining 
yellow  parchment,  and  the  other  a  cluster  of  Grapes  of  Gold.  " 

(p.  27.r 

"  Then  the  Herald  taketh  into  his  hand  from  the  other  child  the 
cluster  oi  grapes,  which  is  of  gold,  both  the  stalk  and  the  grapes,  but 
the  grapes  are  daintily  enamelled.  And  if  the  males  of  the  family  be 
the  greater  number,  the  grapes  are  enamelled  purple,  with  a  little  sun 
set  on  the  top,  if  the  females  then  they  are  enamelled  into  a  greenisli 
yellow,  with  a  crescent  on  the  top.  The  grapes  are  in  number,  as 
there  are  descendants  of  the  family."     (p.  28.) 

Is  there  no  connection  between  this  crescent,  these  grapes  and 
their  number,  with  the  water-marks  I  allude  to  f  The  crescent  is 
evidently  meant  for  the  moon  as  female^  in  opposition  to  the  sun 
as  the  generating  power.  But  the  most  sceptical  reader  will  observe 
these  two,  vine  and  grapes,  belong  to  Bacchus,  the  god  of  the  theatre 
or  drama.  Is  there  no  reference  in  the  number  of  the  grapes  to 
the  number  of  the  plays,  35  ?  Upon  the  next  page  we  are  presented 
with  a  jewel,  made  in  the  form  of  an  ear  of  wheat : 

"  And  withal  delivereth  to  either  of  them  a  jewel,  made  in  the 
figure  of  an  ear  of  wheat,  which  they  ever  after  wear  in  the  front  of 
their  turban  or  hat. "     (p.  28,  New  Atlantis.) 

This  was  the  emblem  of  Demeter  or  Ceres,  the  goddess  of 
agriculture,  and  also  the  symbol  of  her  daughter  Proserpine,  who  is 
Virgo  in  the  heavens,  with  the  star  Spica,  or  the  ear  of  wheat,  near 
her.  Ceres  and  Demeter  are  often  one  and  then  the  other.  So  that 
we  have  here  in  order  suggested  to  us,  by  these  emblems,  Bacchus  and 
Ceres,  the  two  divinities  of  the  drama.  The  title  page  engraving  of 
Bacon's  History  of  King  Henry  the  VII.,  is  one  mass  of  vines  and 
grapes  circling  up  two  columns.  And  it  is  very  curious  to  find  this 
very  same  frontispiece  to  Ben  Jonson's  play  of  Cynthias  Bevels, 
1616  (the  year  Shakespeare  died),  in  the  first  collected  edition  of  his 
works,  a  copy  of  which  I  possess.  The  coincidence  does  not  arise 
from  identity  of  printers,  for  both  works  (Bacon's  K.  H.  VII.  and 
Cynthias  Bevels)  bear  different  publishers'  names. 

The  Indian  Bacchus  was  called  Lenseus,  from  Titfvoi,  a  wine-press, 
because  he  taught  the  use  of  it  in  making  wine.  {Antiquity 
Explained,  Montfaucon,  part  ii.  vol.  i,  p.  144.) 

In  the  plates  Montfaucon  gives  in  his  Antiquity  Explained,  may 
be  seen  how  universally  Bacchus  was  represented,  crowned  with 
grapes,  or  carrying  a  bunch  in  his  hand.  In  others  the  corymbi,  or 
ivy-berries    predominate.    Sometimes    Bacchus   is    to   be   found 


91 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 


crowned  with  vine  leaves  and  grapes,  sometimes  with  the  ivy,  often 
both  combined.    Montfaucon  writes : 


*^  The  crowns  of  ivy  are  as  common  with  Bacchus  as  those  of 
vine-leaves.  Therefore,  it  is  (according  to  Phny,  16,  33)  that  the 
ivy  is  called  Bacchic.  The  ivy  is  consecrated  to  Bacchus,  because 
he  formerly  lay  hid  under  that  tree;  as  others  will  have  it,  because 
the  leaves  of  ivy  resemble  those  of  the  vine.  Anciently  (says  Pliny, 
16,  4),  a  crown  was  given  to  none  but  a  god.  Homer  attributes  one 
only  to  heaven,  and  to  battle,  taken  in  the  universal  sense,  no  man 
wore  it,  even  in  fight.  Father  Bacchus  is  said  to  have  been  the  first 
that  put  a  crown  on  his  head,  and  that,  too,  was  made  of  ivy.  We 
also  find  him  crowned  with  vine-branches,  the  grapes  sometimes 
hanging  down  from  them."     (lb.  p.  147.) 

Montfaucon  gives  over  twenty  plates  of  Bacchus,  taken  from 
gems,  vases  or  statues,  where  the  vine,  grapes  or  ivy  are  to  be  seen, 
either  on  the  head  or  in  the  hands.  Frequently  Bacchus  holds  a 
vessel  in  the  shape  of  a  jug,  out  of  which  he  is  pouring  wine.  It  is 
just  such  a  vessel  as  is  represented  by  the  water-marks  given  by  Mrs. 
Henry  Pott,  in  her  work  Francis  Bacon. 

Nothing  is  more  common  than  the  jug  or  vase  (in  connection  with 
the  Dionysiak,  or  Bacchic  wine  jar),  which  was  carried  in  the  proces- 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF LITEBATUME.  93 

sions  of  the  Anthesteria  or  Feast  of  Flowers  (February  —  March). 
The  type  of  this  renewed  earth-hfe  of  spring  was  wine ;  and  so  we  find 
that  in  the  Bacchian  mysteries,  a  consecrated  cup  of  wine  was 
handed  round  after  supper.  The  second  day  of  the  festival  was 
called  the  Pitcher  Feast,  when  every  toper  had  his  own  cup  and 
vessel.  Thus  the  Herald,  in  the  Acharnes,  proclaims,  "  Hear  ye 
people :  according  to  ancient  custom  the  pitchers  must  be  emptied 
at  the  sound  of  the  trumpet.''  (vs.  1000,  2;  cf.  vs.  1070-1234  )  It 
is  probable  that  the  tragedians  read  to  a  select  audience  the 
"  tragedies  which  they  had  composed  for  the  festival  in  the  follow- 
ing month."  {Donaldson's  Theatre  of  tlie  Greeks,  213.)  (Vide  The 
Great  Bionysiak  Myth,  pp.  233,  234,  vol.  i.  Brown.)  This  ampelus 
or  wine  jar,  may  be  refound  in  the  plates  given  by  Mrs.  Henry  Pott, 
in  her  work  Francis  Bacon  and  his  Secret  Society.  (Plates  xv.,  xvi., 
xvii.,  xviii.,  xix.,  xx.,  xxi.,  xxii. — xxvii.)  The  bunch  of  grapes  and 
the  jar,  ampelus,  or  amphora,  often  with  grapes  coming  out  of  it  (or 
crowned  with  them),  are  the  most  frequent  and  constant  water  marks 
to  be  found  in  Bacon's  works,  as  these  plates  testify,  and  I  am  con- 
vinced they  allude  to  the  vintage  songs,  which  gave  rise  to  the 
origin  of  the  drama,  that  is,  the  dithyambic  chorus  and  Bacchic 
measure : 

''  Dance  we  thy  Bacchic  measure.  Oh  lacchus!  God  of  the  vine, 

Treading  thy  endless  treasure  in  juice  of  the  purple  wine. 

See  how  the  wine  waves  flowing,  waft  the  ivy  wood  bowls  o'er  each 

crest. 
Brightly  the  nectar  glowing,  bears  them  like  boats  on  its  breast ; 
Filling  them  high  with  laughter,  we  pledge  as  we  closely  stand, 
Needing  no  crystal  water,  poured  fresh  by  a  Naiad's  hand." 

{AgatMas.) 
THE  PERSEUS  MYTH. 

There  can  be  very  little  doubt  Bacon  has  introduced  this  fable  of 
Perseus,  in  his  De  Augmentis,  as  a  hint  for  his  Holy  War,  and  the 
Rosicrucians.  Bacon  introduces  three  examples  of  parabolical  poesy 
in  his  De  Augmentis,  in  touch  with  stage  plays,  and  in  touch  also 
with  his  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients.  Indeed,  he  writes,  ''  We  thought 
good  to  refer  philosophy  according  to  ancient  parables,  to  the  num- 
ber of  Deficients. "  (p.  108,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 

Upon  referring  to  the  catalogue  of  the  Deficients  or  A  New 
World  of  Sciences,  at  the  end  of  the  volume,  we  find  this  Deficient 
the  sixth  star,  entitled  Sapientia  Veterum.  Bacon  gives  us  three 
examples,  viz..  Pan",  Perseus  and  Dionysus.  Now,  the  story  of 
Perseus  is  not  only  a  central  myth  of  the  Rosicrucians,  which  we 


91  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

fmd  Michael  Maier  introducing  in  context  witb  direct  allusions  and 
enigmas  concerning  the  fraternity.  But  it  is  a  myth  which  relates  to 
the  freeing  of  the  Church,  and  to  the  House  of  Wisdom,  and  there- 
fore particularly  applicable  to  the  Rosicrucian  ends,  implied  in  freeing 
the  Church  from  the  papal  power,  and  assisting  the  Reformation. 
In  the  preface  of  that  learned  work.  The  Perfect  Way,  the  authors, 
in  describing  this  myth  of  Perseus,  write: 

''  The  names  of  Medusa  and  Andromeda  have  a  common  root, 
and  signify,  respectively,  'guardian'  or  'House  of  Wisdom,' and 
the  ruler  or  helpmeet  of  man.  They  are  thus  typical  names,  the 
first  of  the  church,  the  second  of  the  soul.  And  the  two  myths,  of 
which  their  bearers  are  the  heroines,  together  constitute  a  prophesy 
—  or  perpetual  verity — having  special  application  to  the  present 
epoch.  Medusa  is  that  system  which — originally  pure  and  beauti- 
ful, the  Church  of  God,  and  the  guardian  of  the  Mysteries — has, 
through  corruption  and  idolatry,  become  the  hold  of  'every  unclean 
thing,'  and  the  mother  of  a  monstrous  brood.  And,  moreover,  like 
the  once  lovely  face  of  Medusa,  the  doctrine  which  bore  originally 
the  divine  impress  and  reflected  the  Celestial  Wisdom  Herself,  has 
become,  through  the  fall  of  the  church,  converted  into  dogma  so 
pernicious  and  so  deadly  as  to  blight  and  destroy  the  reason  of  all 
who  come  under  its  control.  And  the  Perseus  of  the  myth  is  the 
true  humanity — earth  born,  indeed,  but  heaven  begotten — which, 
endowed  by  wisdom  and  understanding,  with  the  wings  of  courage, 
the  shield  of  intuition,  and  the  sword  of  science,  is  gone  forth  to 
unite  and  destroy  the  corrupt  church  and  to  deliver  the  world  from 
its  blighting  influence."     (pp.  vi.,  vii.  Preface,  Perfect  Way.) 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  in  the  Proficience  and  Advancement  of 
Learning  of  1605,  these  three  examples  of  parabolical  poetry,  are  not 
introduced  by  Bacon  in  context  with  the  subject  of  parabolical 
poetry.  They  are  first  found  in  the  1623  De  Augmentis.  I  wish  to 
point  out,  they  are  evidently  introduced  with  a  profound  purpose  — 
that  is,  to  connect  or  show  a  connection  between  Bacon's  Wisdo^n 
of  the  Ancients  and  his  theatre.  Nobody  will  doubt  that  who  reads 
the  final  words  with  which  he  closes  these  three  fables,  on  pag3  109 
of  Advancement,  1640:  "  We  stay  too  long  in  the  theatre;  let  us 
pass  on  to  the  palace  of  the  mind. "  It  is  just  as  examples  of  para- 
bolical poetry,  which  are  to  serve  as  illustration  and  obscuration,  or 
which  tend  *'  to  the  folding  up  of  those  things  the  dignity  whereof 
deserves  to  be  retired  and  distinguished,  as  with  a  Drawn  Cur- 
tain; that  is,  when  the  secrets  and  mysteries  of  religion,  policy 
and  philosophy  are  veiled  and  invested  with  fables  and 
parables  "  (p.  108),  that  Bacon  introduces  the  examples  of  Pan, 
Perseus  and  Dionysus,  with  these  words : 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUHE.  95 

"  And  we  will  annex  an  example  or  two  of  this  work,  not  that 
the  matter,  perhaps,  is  of  such  moment,  but  to  maintain  the  pur- 
pose of  our  design.  That  is  this :  that  if  any  portion  of  these  works 
which  we  report  as  deficient,  chance  to  be  more  obscure  than  ordi- 
nary, that  we  always  propose  either  precepts  or  examples  for  the 
perfecting  of  that  work,  lest,  perchance,  some  should  imagine  that 
our  conceit  hath  only  comprehended  some  light  notions  of  them, 
and  that  we,  like  augurs,  only  measure  countries  in  our  minds,  but 
know  not  how  to  set  one  foot  forward  thither.  As  for  any  other 
part  defective  in  poesy,  we  find  none ;  nay,  rather,  poesy  being  a 
plant  coming,  as  it  were,  from  the  lust  of  a  rank  soil,  without  any 
certain  seed,  it  hath  sprung  up  and  spread  abroad  above  all  other 
kind  of  learning"  (p.  109). 

The  student  is  entreated  to  mark,  Bacon  repeats  the  same 
language  in  his  Distribution  Preface  touching  these  Deficients,  which 
play  evidently  a  first  part  in  the  unlocking  of  the  Instauration. 

*'  Concerning  those  parts  which  we  shall  note  as  Praetermitted, 
we  will  so  regulate  ourselves,  as  to  set  down  more  than  tbe  naked 
titles,  or  brief  arguments  of  Deficients.  For  where  we  deliver  up 
anything  as  a  Desiderate,  so  it  be  a  matter  of  merit ;  and  the  reason 
thereof  may  seem  somewhat  obscure,  so  as  upon  good  consideration, 
we  may  doubt,  that  we  shall  not  be  so  easily  conceived  what  we 
intend,  or  what  the  contemplation  is,  we  comprehend  in  our  mind,  and 
in  our  meditation,  there  it  shall  ever  be  our  precise  care,  to  annex 
either  precepts  for  the  performing  of  such  a  work,  or  a  part  of  the 

WORK  ITSELF    PERFORMED    BY    US   ALREADY,    for   example    tO    the 

whole,  that  so  we  may  in  every  particular,  either  by  operation  or 
information,  promote  the  business.  For  in  my  judgment,  it  is  a 
matter  which  concerns  not  only  the  benefit  of  others,  but  our  own 
reputation  also,  that  no  man  imagine  we  have  projected  in  our 
minds  some  slight  superficial  notion  of  these  Designs;  and  that  they 
are  of  the  nature  of  those  things  which  we  could  desire,  and  which 
we  accept  only  as  good  wishes.  For  they  are  such  as,  without  ques- 
tion, are  within  the  power  and  possibility  of  men  to  compass,  unless 
they  be  wanting  to  themselves ;  and  hereof,  we  for  our  parts,  have 
certain  and  evident  demonstration,  for  we  come  not  hither  as 
augurs  to  measure  countries  in  our  mind  for  divination,  but  as 
captains  to  invade  them  for  a  conquest,  (p.  23,  Distribution 
Preface,  1640  Advancement.) 

The  reader  notices  the  repetition  of  the  same  language  quoted, 
page  109  of  this  Advancement,  1640.  It  is  plain  and  certain  Bacon 
is  here  describing,  one  of  the  most  important  keys  to  the  opening  of 
the  Instauration — that  is,  works  already  completed  hy  Bacon,  in 
their  relationship  to  the  Instauration  and  its  ends,  as  an  entire  whole. 
He  shows  plainly  that  he  is  intentionally  obscure,  and  that  part  of 
the  work  "  performed  by  us  already, "  is  hinted  at  by  these  Deficients 
The  subject  we  treat  of  illustrates  exactly  in  point.    The  fables  of 


m  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

Pan,  Perseus,  Dionysus,  given  by  Bacon  as  examples  of  parabolical 
poetry,  exist  in  bis  collection,  entitled  tbe  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients, 
showing  we  are  to  study  tbe  entire  collection  in  reference  to  para- 
bolical poetry  and  stage  plays,  witb  wbicb  tbe  examples  cited  are 
connoted. 

From  tbis  digression,  I  return  to  tbe  subject  of  this  cbapter,  tbe 
fable  of  Perseus.  Bacon  interprets  it  as  an  example  of  war  and  as 
political.  Now,  we  must  remember  tbe  Rosicrucians  entitled  tbem- 
selves  militia  crucifera  evangelica — soldiers  of  tbe  cross.  Tbey  were 
tbe  lineal  inberitors  of  tbe  Knigbts  Templar  or  Red  Cross  Knigbts. 
Tbeir  ends  or  objects  was  like  tbe  Templars,  tbe  rebuilding  or  restor- 
ing of  Solomon's  Temple  —  wbicb  really  means  a  restoration  of  man's 
estate  to  primeval  purity — a  restoration  of  arts  and  sciences,  of 
morals,  and  a  rescuing  of  man  from  bis  fallen  condition  by  means  of 
tbeir  cornerstone,  Christ.  Like  tbe  Salvation  Army  of  to-day,  tbey 
considered  themselves  soldiers  fighting  for  the  good  cause,  and  tbe 
myth  of  Perseus  as  tbe  redeemer  of  the  drawn  sword  or  cabir,  was 
their  selected  and  particular  emblem.  Tbey  called  themselves  Invis- 
ibles. And  we  can  see  Bacon  slyly  hinting  at  this  as  an  art  poli- 
tique, when  be  writes  that  Perseus  borrowed  from  Mercury  wings, 
Pallas  a  shield,  and  Pluto  a  helmet. 

"  Now  tbe  helmet  of  Pluto,  which  bath  power  to  make  men 
invisible,  is  plain  in  the  moral,  for  the  secreting  of  counsels,  next  to 
celerity,  is  of  great  moment  in  war^^  (page  124  Advancement  of 
Learning).  Bacon's  Holy  War  was  evidently  written  with  a  pro- 
found view  to  some  secret  society,  or  order,  which  I  am  convinced 
was  tbe  Rosicrucians.    For  example,  be  writes : 

''  Tbe  church,  indeed,  maketh  her  missions  into  tbe  extreme  part 
of  the  nations  and  isles,  and  it  is  well ;  but  tbis  is  ecce  unus  gladius 
hie.  The  Christian  princes  and  potentates  are  they  that  are 
wanting  to  the  propagation  of  the  faith  by  tbeir  arms.  Yet  our 
Lord  that  said  on  earth  to  tbe  disciples,  ite  et  prcedicate,  said  from 
heaven  to  Constantine,  in  hoc  signo  vinces.  What  Christian  soldier 
is  there  that  will  not  be  touched  witb  a  religious  emulation  to  see 
an  order  of  Jesus,  or  of  Saint  Francis,  or  of  Saint  Augustin  do  such 
service  for  enlarging  tbe  Christian  borders ;  and  an  order  of  Saint 
lago,  or  Saint  Michael,  or  Saint  George  only  to  robe  and  feast  and 
perform  rites  and  observances?  "     {Holy  War,  p.  34.) 

Now  there  are  three  distinct  allusions  or  references  here  to  the 
Rosicrucians,  direct  and  unmistakable!  —  Tbe  first  is  Ecce  unus 
gladius  hie, — this  is  the  fiery  sword  that  revolved  in  front  of  the 
cherubim,  which  smote  all  tbe  sinful  who  sought  to  re-enter  Para- 
dise. , 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  97 

"  It  is  the  sword  of  the  Knights  Templar  among  the  Mazons, 
when  the  newly  initiate  is  ordered  to  lay  aside  the  staffer  rod  of  the 
twelfth  messenger,  and  take  up  the  sword.  It  is  the  Red-Cross 
Sword  of  Babylon;  the  badge  of  the  sword  of  the  East.''  (Kenealy 
Enoch,  ii.  83).  It  is  the  sword  of  the  arch-angel  Michael,  and,  as 
Nimrod  points  out,  was  a  Rosicrucian  emblem  —  a  naked  sword! 
Bacon  next  refers  to  the  Rosicrucian  motto  of  Constantine,  in  hoc 
signo  vinces,  or  the  emblem  which  gave  rise  to  the  red  cross  by  the 
emperor  himself,  and  which  the  Knights  Templar  bore  ever  after- 
ward on  their  cloaks  and  banners.  But  note  how  finally  Bacon 
refers  to  the  orders  of  Saint  Michael,  and  Saint  George,  in  an  interro- 
gatory way ;  and  there  is  no  doubt  the  Rosicrucians,  were  most 
intimately  connected  with  these  two  orders.  For  I  find  the  great 
Rosicrucian  Michael  Maier  referring  to  the  order  of  Saint  George  in 
direct  context  with  the  fraternity. 

Hargreave  Jennings  writes : 

"  The  bond  and  mark  of  this  brotherwood  is  the  Red  Cross  of 
Crucifixion.  The  '  Red  Cross '  which  is  the  cross  of  the  '  Rosicru- 
cians, '  thence  their  name."  (p.  100,  vol.  ii.  The  Rosicrucians,  their 
Rites  and  Mysteries.) 

Again : 

"  Even  the  badge  and  star  and  symbol  of  this  most  Christian 
order,  which  presents  this  red  or  sanguine  cross  of  the  Redeemer, 
imaged  in  the  cognisance  of  His  champion  or  captain,  or  chief  sol- 
dier, St.  George  or  St.  Michael,  the  trampler  of  the  dragon  and 
custos  of  the  keys  of  the  bottomless  pit. "     (lb.  p.  101.) 

In  the  seventh  chapter  of  this  work  (volume  ii.),  may  be  found 
proofs  of  connection  of  the  Rosicrucians  with  the  order  of  the  Garter, 
or  St.  George.  There  can  hardly  be  a  doubt.  Bacon  is  proposing  a 
peaceful  crusade  of  a  reforming  tendency,  in  this  tract  of  a  Holy  War. 
It  was  not  written  for  the  Rosicrucians  or  initiated  alone,  but  to  fur- 
nish a  side  key  or  hint  for  posterity  in  these  allusions. 

**  God,  say  the  Rabbins,  conferred  upon  Michael  his  own  name, 
Shaddai  Omnipotence ;  he  is  the  depositary  of  God's  secrets. "  (p. 
83,  vol  ii.  Enoch.) 

Of  the  sword,  Nimrod  writes : 

"  The  age  of  paradise  was  golden,  the  fruit  in  the  fortunate  gar- 
dens of  Medusa  was  golden ;  and  chry-saor,  the  golden  sword  (a  title 
of  Apollo)  probably  alludes  to  the  cruciform  fire  which  stood  between 
the  Cherubim,  at  the  eastern  gates  of  paradise."  (p.  11,  vol.  i. 
Fable  and  History.) 

7 


&8  TH:^  COLUMBUS  OF"  LiTEHATlTRJE:, 

Bacon  in  his  fable  of  Perseus,  writes  : 

"  After  the  war  was  finished,  and  that  victory  was  won,  there 
followed  two  effects :  the  procreation  and  raising  of  Pegasus ;  which 
evidently  denotes  fame  that  flying  through  the  world  proclaims 
victory. "    (125-126,  Perseus. ) 

Bacon  takes  care  to  avoid  stating  the  other  procreation  of 
Apollo !  But  the  fact,  he  introduces  in  italics  Pegasus  or  poetry ^ 
shows  what  he  is  really  alluding  to,  viz.,  Apollo  and  poetry.  Now 
the  protagonist  of  the  Eosicrucians  was  Apollo.  Bacon  figures  as 
Apollo,  in  "  The  Great  Assizes,  held  at  Parnassus,  by  order  of 
Apollo,''  given  by  George  Withers,  the  poet. 

Sir  William  Brown  writes  of  St.  George:  "As  for  the  story 
depending  hereon,  some  conceive  as  lightly  thereof  as  that  of 
Perseus  and  Andromeda,  conjecturing  the  one  to  he  the  father  of  the 
other. ''^  {Enquiries  into  Vulgar  and  Common  Errors,  booli  v.  p. 
211,  vii.  edition,  1686.)  St.  George  was  the  patron  saint  of  the  Eosi- 
crucians ;  and  Hargreave  Jennings,  in  his  Rites  and  Mysteries  of  the 
MosicrucianSj  points  this  out.  The  legend  of  St.  George  is,  without 
doubt,  horroivcd  from  the  classic  fable  of  Perseus  and  Andromeda,  as 
is  made  clear  by  so  great  an  authority  as  Mr.  Kuskin,  in  his  second 
supplement  to  St.  Marks  Best,  entitled  the  place  of  Dragons : 

"  The  earliest  and  central  shrine  of  St.  George, "  writes  Mr* 
Ruskin,  "  rose  at  Lydda,  by  the  stream  which  Pausanias,  in  the  sec- 
ond century,  saw  running  still  red  as  blood,  because  Persenshad 
bathed  there  after  his  conquest  of  the  sea  monster. 

"  There  is  a  large  body  of  evidence  proving  the  origin  of  the  story 
of  St.  George  and  the  Dragon  from  that  of  Perseus.  The  names  of 
certain  of  the  persons  concerned  in  both  coincide.  Secondary,  or 
later  variations  in  the  place  of  the  fight  appear  alike  in  both  legends. 
For  example,  the  scene  of  both  is  laid  in  Phoenicia,  north  of  Joppa. 
The  stories  of  the  fight  given  by  Greeks  and  Christians  are  almost 
identical.  There  is  scarcely  an  incident  in  it  told  by  one  set  of 
vn^iters  but  occurs  in  the  account  given  by  some  member  or  mem- 
bers of  the  other  set,  even  to  the  crowd  of  distant  spectators,  and  to 
the  votive  altars  raised  above  the  body  of  the  monster,  with  the 
stream  of  healing  that  flowed  from  them.  And  while  both  accounts 
say  how  the  saved  nations  rendered  thanks  to  the  Father  in  heaven, 
we  are  told  that  the  heathen  placed  beside  His  altar,  altars  to  the 
maiden  wisdom  and  to  Hermes,  while  the  Christians  placed  altars 
dedicated  to  the  maiden  mother,  and  to  Saint  George." 

This  is  most  important  evidence,  because  it  is  a  fact  (not  theory 
or  surmise)  the  Eosicrucians  held  St.  George  with  his  Eed  Cross 
(their  emblem)  as  their  chief  tutelary  patron,  and  this  is  one  of  the 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  99 

reasons  the  society  is  connected  with  the  noble  order  of  the  Garter — 
as  Mr.  Hargreave  Jennings  truly  asserts.  But  first  I  will  adduce 
Michael  Maier  as  evidence  to  the  part  St.  George  played  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  society. 

In  his  Themis  Aurea,  or,  Laws  of  the  Fraternity  of  the  Rosi- 
crucians,  he  writes : 

"  Habent  ordines  equestres  quique  sua  insignia,  Rhodii  sen 
Maltenses  duphcis  crucis,  Burgundiaci  Velleris  Aurei,  S.  Georgii 
fasciae  tibiahs  (olim  de  crure  mulieris  in  chorea  delapsa?)  et  alii 
alia.  Hi  vero  fratres,  qui  non  minus  Deo  militant  bonam  militiam, 
habent  R.  C.  pro  suo  sigillo,  quod  non  auro  ostentant,  sed  in  papyro. 
Melitenses  scimus  equites  magno  pietatis  zelo  elegisse  imaginem 
geminsB  crucis  in  memoriam  Christi  salvatoris,  qui  in  ea  pepende- 
rat,  accipientes  signum  pro  signato,  vel  continens  pro  contento. 
Idem  de  Velleris  aurei  signaculo  statuendum  est  que,  licet  prima 
origine  magis  sit  allegoricum  et  Chymicum  quam  historicum,  ut  in 
Hieroglph.  (lib  2,)  satis  demonstravimus,  tamen  ad  agnum  Dei 
tropice  referri  potest  in  pietatis  exercitium.  An  tale  quid  de 
periscelide  sen  tibiali  muliebris  cruris  vinculo  intelligi  possit,  nescio, 
an  non  magis  ad  partem  spectet,  cui  illigatum  fuit,  corporis  que 
mentis,  non  est  meum  judicare.  Veritas  hie  loquat  nuda  et  S. 
Georg  (Utopiensis)  sit  arbiter  ''  (pp.  157-158  Themis  Aurea  hoc  est 
De  Legibus  Fraternitalis  R.  C  Michael  Maier.  Francofurti  Typis 
Nicolai  Hoffmanni,  1618). 

It  is  easy  to  see  Mr.  Hargreave  Jennings  borrowed  much  of  his 
subject  matter,  concerning  the  Order  of  the  Garter,  its  mystic  origin, 
and  its  connection  with  the  Rosicrucians,  from  this  passage. 

"  Perseus  conquered  the  head  of  Medusa,  and  did  make  Pegasus 
the  most  swift  ship,  which  he  always  calls  Perseus'  flying  horse" 
{Destruction  of  Troy.)    It  is  very  striking  to  find  this  idea  repeated 
in  Troilus  and  Cressida,  which  deals  with  the  siege  of  Troy : 
The  strong-ribbed  bark  through  liquid  mountains  cut 
Like  Perseus'  horse.     {Troilus  and  Cressida,  i.  3.) 

It  is  well  worthy  note,  Bacon  introduces  this  fable  of  Perseus,  in 
his  De  AugmentiSf  as  an  example  of  parabolical  poesy,  and  that  the 
entire  emblem  of  the  De  Augmentis  is  that  of  a  ship.  This  simile 
connects  possibly  the  De  Augmentis  with  poetry  as  Pegasus  or  a 
ship. 

The  whole  of  Lord  Bacon's  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients,  were 
written  expressly  for  application  to  the  plays,  is  my  profound  con- 
viction—  I  might  say  my  knowledge.  It  does  not  require  much 
classical  erudition  to  discover  the  fact,  these  pieces  are  all  more  or 
less  part  and  belongings  of  the  Ancient  Mysteries,  and  treat  just  of 
those  heathen  antiquities,  which  not  only  possess  a  meaning,  but 


100  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

which  carry  to  the  initiated,  certain  knowledge  of  the  migration  of 
races,  and  arcana  of  nature,  which  myths  and  parables  were  vehicles 
by  which  the  secret  doctrines  of  antiquity  were  veiled  and  handed 
on  to  posterity,  from  the  times  of  the  institution  of  the  Panathenaic 
games  by  Erichthonius,  back  to  the  times  of  Sais  and  Atlantis. 

There  are  certain  pieces  of  this  collection  which  reveal  their  esoteric 
character  out  of  hand,  viz.,  the  fable  of  Proserpine,  of  Prometheus, 
of  Styx,  of  Dionysius,  of  Narcissus,  of  Pan,  of  Acteon  and  Pentheus, 
of  Daedalus,  of  Ericthonius,  all  these  belong  to  the  Mysteries  of 
Eleusis,  Bacchus,  Apollo  and  Ceres,  round  which  the  Greek  classical 
drama  had  its  origin.  It  is  impossible  for  me  to  go  into  such  details 
of  proof  as  I  should  wish,  but  I  can  briefly  indicate  a  few  prominent 
features  of  importance. 

Proserpine  or  Persephone,  formea  the  leading  myth  center  of  the 
Elusinian  Mysteries,  and  she  and  her  mother  Ceres  (or  Demeter),  repre- 
sented the  earth  life,  with  its  yearly  death  and  resuscitation.  Those 
who  desire  to  study  this  myth,  will  find  in  Thomas  Taylor's  Bacchic  and 
Eleusinian  Mysteries,  proof  that  Dionysius  or  Bacchus,  Ceres  and 
Proserpine  belonged  to  the  very  heart  and  center  of  the  sacred 
shows,  and  were  the  protaganists  of  the  drama  and  agriculture. 
Virgil's  Georgics  prove  the  latter  case.  Bacon,  therefore,  terms  his 
ethics,  which  deal  (mark)  with  characters,  or  the  motives  of  passion 
acting  on  passions,  and  affections  (the  drama  motive)  Geokgics  of 
THE  Mind.     (Book  vii..  Advancement  of  Learning,  1623.) 

In  Perdita  and  Hermione  of  the  Winter^ s  Tale,  we  may  perceive 
Persephone  (or  Proserpine),  Ceres  (or  Demeter),  as  plainly  as  we  per- 
ceive the  sun  in  the  heavens. 

Prometheus  again  was  a  mystery  parable  of  Man^s  Fall  —  a 
heathen  story  generically  applied  of  the  divine  within  us,  joined  to 
the  animal — the  soul  bound  in  the  bonds  of  the  flesh,  and  preyed 
upon  by  the  vulture  of  concupiscence,  which  latter  the  ancients 
placed  in  the  liver,  ^schylus  wrote  a  ijlay  or  tragedy  upon  it,  and 
narrowly  escaped  death,  from  the  charge  of  revealing  the  secret 
doctrines  of  the  mysteries,  of  which  this  myth  was  a  leading  feature. 

Narcissus  was  also  a  story  allied  to  the  Mysteries,  for  it  was  the 
Narcissus  Flower  Proserpine  was  gathering  when  she  was  carried 
off  by  Dis  or  Pluto. 

Bacon  writes  in  his  fable  of  Proserpine  :  "  And  it  is  elegantly 
added  that  Proserpine  was  ravished  whilst  she  gathered  Narcissus 
flowers,  which  have  their  name  from  numbness  or  stupefaction." 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITER ATUBE.  101 

The  Sirens  or  Pleasures  Bacon  has  apphed  to  the  action  of  the 
Comedy  of  Errors. 

Let  us  glance  at  the  view  Bacon  took  of  these  poetical  fables  in 
his  preface  to  the  collection.  I  propose  to  note  the  reasons  apparent 
for  his  selection  of  these  particular  pieces,  and  in  the  first  words  he 
■opens  his  preface,  may  he  perceived  that  it  is  the  remotest  antiqity 
he  is  studying,  as  a  vehicle  of  truth  through  these  supposed  myths: 

"  The  earliest  antiquity  hes  buried  in  silence  and  oblivion, 
excepting  the  remains  of  it  we  have  in  sacred  writ.  This  silence 
was  succeeded  by  poetical  fables,  and  these  at  length  by  the 
writings  we  now  enjoy ;  so  that  the  concealed  and  secret  learning 
of  the  ancients  seems  separated  from  the  history  and  knowledge  by  a 
veil  or  partition  wall  of  fables,  interposing  between  the  things  that 
are  lost  and  those  that  remain." 

*'  But  the  argument  of  most  weight  with  me  is  this,  that  many 
of  these  fables  by  no  means  appear  to  have  been  invented  by  the 
persons  who  relate  and  divulge  them,  whether  Homer,  Hesiod,  or 
others ;  for  if  I  were  assured  they  first  flowed  from  these  later  times 
and  authors  that  transmit  them  to  us,  I  should  never  expect  any- 
thing singularly  great  or  noble  from  such  an  origin.  But  whoever 
attentively  considers  the  thing,  will  find  that  these  fables  are 
delivered  down  and  related  by  those  writers,  not  as  matters  then  first 
invented  and  proposed,  but  as  things  received  and  embraced  in 
earlier  ages.  Besides,  as  they  are  differently  related  by  writers 
nearly  of  the  same  ages,  it  is  easily  perceived  that  the  relators  drew 
from  the  common  stock  of  ancient  tradition.  And  this  principally 
raises  my  esteem  of  these  fables,  which  I  receive,  not  as  the  product 
of  that  age,  or  invention  of  the  poets,  but  as  sacred  relics,  gentle 
whispers  of  the  breath  of  better  times,  that  from  the  traditions  of 
more  ancient  nations  came  at  length  into  the  flutes  and  trumpets  of 
the  Greeks."    (Preface  to  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients.) 

It  is  as  SACRED  RELICS,  Bacou  esteems  these  fables,  and  we 
easily  may  perceive  in  his  selection  of  Atlantis,  for  the  seat  of  his 
philosophical  romance,  the  source  with  which  he  associated  the 
secret  doctrines  of  prehistoric  antiquity.  The  author  of  Tlie  Tarot 
of  the  Bohemians,  writes : 

"  If  we  would  condescend  to  waive,  for  one  moment,  our  belief  in 
the  indefinite  progress  and  fatal  superiority  of  later  generations  over 
the  ancients,  we  should  at  once  perceive  that  the  colossal  civiliza- 
tions of  antiquity  possessed  science,  universities  and  schools." 
(Papus,  p.  4.) 

The  same  writer : 

"  Moses  had  chosen  a  people  to  hand  down,  through  succeeding 
ages  the  book  which  contained  all  the  science  of  Egypt;  but  before 
Moses  the  Hindu  Initiates  had  selected  a  nation  to  hand  down  to  the 


102  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

generations  of  the  future  the  primitive  doctrines  of  the  Atlantides.^^ 
(lb.  p.  5.) 

Dionysius  of  Samos  (or  Mytilene)  chose  the  tvestern  coast  of  Africa 
as  the  original  abode  of  the  deities  adored  in  Greece.  And  Homer, 
whose  authority  we  cannot  gainsay,  calls  Oceauos,  whose  abode 
was  placed  in  the  West,  as  the  origin  of  the  gods, 

DiHsavov  re,  OecSv  j^srsdiv  uai  pirjTspa  Trfivv. 

{Iliad,  xiv.  201.) 

"  According  to  those  writers  the  coast  of  Ocean  was  inhabited 
by  a  race  of  people  named  Atalanteians.'^  (p.  23,  Keightley^s  Myth- 
ology.) 

The  same  author  writes : 

"  But  the  great  authorities  of  the  Greeks  were  the  Phoenicians 
respecting  foreign  lauds,  who,  in  the  most  distant  ages  visited  the 
shores  of  the  Atlantic,  and  it  is  likely,  after  the  fashion  of  travelers, 
they  narrated  the  most  surprising  tales  of  the  marvels  of  the 
Remote  regions  to  which  they  had  penetrated."     (lb.  29.) 

Plato  tells  us  the  priests  of  Sals  informed  Solon,  out  of  ''  their 
temple  archives,  that  the  goddess  Neith  or  Athena  was  the  founder 
of  both  their  cities,  but  Athens  was  the  elder  by  one  thousand  years. 
When  in  those  remote  ages  the  people  of  the  Isle  Atlantis  invaded 
the  countries  within  the  pillars  of  Hercules,  the  Athenians  bravely 
repelled  them,  and  in  the  war  Cecrops,  Erechtheus,  Erichthonios 
and  Erysichthon  distinguished  themselves  ''  {Timceos,  21,  et  seq.; 
Critias,  108,  et  seq.) 

It  is  well  worthy  a  passing  note  that  two  pieces  of  Bacon's  Wis- 
dom of  the  Ancients  bear  title  "  Erichthonios  or  Imposture, " 
'*  Metis  or  Counsel. "  The  former  is  most  intimately  connected  both 
with  the  Mysteries  and  Atlantis. 

"  Erichthonios  was  reared  by  Athena  in  her  Temenos.  He  set 
up  the  statue  of  Athena  on  the  Acropolis,  and  instituted  the  festival 
of  the  Panathensea. "  {Keightley  Myth.  335.)  "The  two  kings, 
Erechtheus  and  Erichthonios,  are  the  same  person,  and  in  reality 
nothing  more  than  the  name  by  which  Poseidon  was  worshipped  on 
the  Acropolis. "     (lb.  350.) 

To  these  two  have  been  attributed  the  founding  of  the  Eleusinian 
Mysteries,  and  no  doubt  they  belong  to  a  period  of  extreme  anti- 
quity in  which  Sais,  in  Egypt,  sent  forth  the  Greek  colonists,  under 
Cecrops  and  when  Atlantis  still  flourished.  In  Bacon's  "  Metis  or 
Counsel"  we  have,  of  course,  Minerva  or  Athena,  and  I  should  like 
to  observe  that  Olivia  in  Twelfth  Night  has  certain  text  connotations 
suggesting  a  veiled  goddess.  The  olive  was  sacred  to  Athena  and  the 
name  Olivia  is  derived  from  it. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  103 

It  may  be  noticed  Olivia  is  presented  just  as  Isis  and  Athena,  or 
the  goddess  Neith  of  the  Egyptians  at  Sais  was  presented,  that  is. 
Veiled.  This  goddess,  by  the  way,  is  supposed  to  have  been  the 
original  from  whence  Mr.  Rider  Haggard  borrowed  his  immortal 
SJie. 

Vol.    So  please  my  Lord,  /  )night  not  be  admitted; 
But  from  her  handmaid  do  return  this  answer : 
The  element  itself,  till  seven  years'  hpat 
Shall  not  behold  her  face  at  ample  view 
But  like  a  cloistress,  she  will  veiled  walk. 

{Act  i.  sc.  1,  Twelfth  Night.) 

Viola.    Good  madam,  let  us  see  pour  face. 

Olivia.    Have  you  any  commission  from    your  Lord  to  negotiate 
with  my  face  f    You  are  now  out  of  you  text;  but  tve  tvill  draw  the 
curtain  and  show  you  the  picture.    Look  you,  sir,  such  a  one  I  was 
this  presents,  is't  not  well  done?     [Unveiling.] 
Viola.    Excellently  done,  if  God  did  all. 
Olivia.    ^Tis  in  grain,  sir;  Vwill  endure  wind  and  weather. 
Viola.    'Tis  beauty  truly  blent,  whose  red  and  white. 
Nature's  own  sweet  and  cunning  hand  laid  on. 

(Act  i.  sc.  5.) 
It  is  certain  Olivia  is  intended  to  be  a  statue,  if  we  can  go  by 
the  text:  ^Tis  in  grain,  sir,  Vwill  endure  wind  and  weather. 
.  All  this  is  reinforced  by  the  opening  of  the  play,  in  which  Orsino 
compares  his  love  for  Olivia,  to  the  fable  of  Actaeon,  who  was  torn  in 
pieces  by  his  dogs,  after  he  had  been  turned  into  a  stag  for  gazing 
upon  Diana  naked. 

Curio.  Will  you  go  hunt,  my  lord  ? 

JDuke.  What,  Curio? 

Curio.  The  hart. 

Buke.  Why  so  I  do,  the  noblest  that  I  have : 
0  when  mine  eyes  did  see  Olivia  first, 
Methought  she  purged  the  air  of  pestilence  ! 
That  instant  was  I  turned  into  a  hart ; 
And  my  desires  like  fell  and  cruel  hounds 
E'er  since  pursue  me. 

(Act  i.  sc.  1.) 

Lord  Bacon,  in  his  collection  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients,  writes^ 
under  "  Act^o:?^  or  a  curious  man  "  : 

"  The  ancients  afford  us  two  examples  for  suppressing  the  imperti- 
nent curiosity  of  mankind  in  diving  into  secrets.  Actaeon,  undesign- 
edly chancing  to  see  Diana  naked  was  turned  into  a  stag  and  torn 
to  pieces  by  his  own  hounds. " 

The  profound  student  must  observe  here,  how  very  aptly  such  a 
fable  (interpreted  by  Bacon  as,  curiosity  or  diving  into  secrets), 


104  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUME. 

applies  to  the  duke's  love  for  Olivia,  which  though  subtly  disguised 
as  ordinary  love,  I  am  convinced  is  a  representative  allusive  picture 
of  an  attempt  to  lift  the  veil  of  Isis  or  Athena  {wisdom)  or  Olivia. 
The  Olive  was  sacred  to  Minerva,  or  Athena,  and  hence  the  name 
Olivia  very  aptly  falls  in  with  my  theory.  Moreover  the  student 
will  notice  Viola  is  presented  as  Eunuch,  the  priests  of  all  these 
great  goddesses  like  Diana  and  Isis  being  eunuchs.  Viola  speaks 
in  many  sorts  of  music,  as  her  name  implies,  and,  moreover,  the  hart 
or  stag  was  the  emblem  of  the  great  nature  goddess,  Diana. 

I  would  here  draw  the  student's  attention  to  chapter  iii..  Liber. 
V.  9,  the  Be  Augmentis  (or  its  translation  by  Watts,  1640,  page  237). 
That  chapter  deals  with  ''  The  partition  of  the  inventive  arts  of 
arguments  J  into  promptuary  or  places  of  preparation,  and  topics  or 
places  of  suggestion.'^  Bacon  describes  this  in  the  following  words: 
"  For  it  may  be  as  well  accounted  a  chase  or  finding  of  a  deer,  which 
is  made  within  an  enclosed  park,  as  that  within  a  forest  at  large.  But 
setting  aside  curiosity  of  words,  it  may  appear  that  the  scope  and 
end  of  this  kind  of  inventio:n'  (discovery),  is  a  certain  promptitude 
and  expedite  use  of  our  knowledge,  rather  than  any  encrease  or  ampli- 
fication thereof. "     (p.  237. ) 

In  the  fifth  chapter  of  the  same  book.  Bacon  once  more  reintro- 
duces this  image  of  the  deer,  in  connection  with  Prenotion  and 
Emblem.  In  recovering  knowledge,  or  memory,  we  must  possess 
some  prenotion  or  emblem  which,  as  it  were,  narrows  the  search  and 
cuts  off  the  infinite.    He  suggests : 

'^  This  art  of  memory  is  built  upon  two  intentions,  Prenotion  and 
Emblem.  We  call  prenotion  a  precision  of  endless  investigation,  for 
when  a  man  would  recall  anything  to  memory,  if  he  have  no  pre- 
notion or  preception  of  that  he  seeketh,  he  searcheth,  indeed,  and 
taketh  pains,  sounding  this  way  and  that  way,  as  in  a  maze  of 
infinity.  But  if  he  have  any  cert Sim prenotion,  presently  that  which 
is  infinite  is  discharged  and  cut  off,  and  the  questing  of  the  memory 
is  brought  within  a  narrow  compass,  as  the  hunting  of  a  Fallow 
Deer  within  the  Park.''    (p.  255.) 

Nobody  can  fail  to  perceive  what  Bacon  is  driving  at,  for  he  is 
giving  us  the  emblem  for  the  prenotion,  which  we  are  to  follow  up  in 
the  plays  as  a  promptuary  place  of  suggestion  for  assistance  and 
guidance.  In  Love's  Labor's  Lost,  we  have  Kosalind  presented,  with 
unmistakable  text  allusions,  connecting  her  with  Diana  of  Ephesus, 
goddess  of  nature,  whose  emblem  was  a  stag  or  deer.  Moreover,  in 
the  play  a  great  deal  of  enigmatic  and  utterly  incomprehensible 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  105 

dialogue  turns  upon  the  hunting  of  a  deer,  which  is  identified  with 
Rosalind  herself. 

Boyet.  And  who  is  your  deerf 

Rosalind.  If  we  choose  by  the  horns,  yourself  come  not  near. 

Of  all  the  plays  of  the  1623  Folio,  Lovers  Lahor^s  Lost  is  the  most 
esoteric  and  enigmatical.  The  text  is  clean  away  from  simplicity  or 
the  action  of  the  characters, — less  art  of  concealment  has  been  intro- 
duced in  this  than  any  other  play  of  the  collection.  It  is  my  convic- 
tion Bacon's  emblem  of  the  Beer,  (quoted)  as  hunted  in  a  Park,  is  a 
prenotion  he  gives  us  as  promptuary  place  of  suggestion  for  this  play. 

Hoi.  I  will  something  afifect  the  letter,  for  it  argues  facility. 
The  playful  princess  pierced  and  pricked  a  pretty  pleasing  pricket ; 

Some  say  a  sore ;  but  not  a  sore,  till  now  made  sore  with  shooting. 
The  dogs  did  yell;  put  l  to  sore  then  sorel  jumps  from  thicket; 

Or  pricket  sore,  or  else  sorel ;  the  people  fall  a-hooting. 
If  sore  be  sore,  then  l  to  sore  makes  fifty  sores  one  sorel. 

Of  one  sore  I  an  hundred  make  by  adding  one  more  l.  (Act  iv.  2. ) 

This  is  clearly  a  rebus,  an  acrostic  connected  with  a  cipher  and 
the  deer,  as  indeed  is  the  entire  play. 

Armado.    A  most  fine  figure. 

Moth.    To  prove  you  a  cipher.  (Act  i.) 

All  this  may,  and  will  appear  preposterous,  impossible,  and  too 
subtle  for  the  critic,  and  so  it  will  remain  until  the  Instauration 
begins  to  be  opened  up,  and  the  world  recognizes  in  these  pieces, 
Philosophical  Play  Systems  (Bacon's  own  words),  which  are  married 
to  an  inductive  system,  and  will  have  to  be  worked  out  by  help  of  his 
Advancement  of  Learning,  and  evolved  out  of  a  labyrinth  of  matter 
as  subtle  as  nature  itself. 

MALVOLIO,  OK  MALICE  AND   VANITY. 

I  am  convinced  MalvoUo  is  an  ironical  portrait  of  human  Vanity, 
Ignorance,  Malice  or  Malevolence,  which  latter  word  agrees  much 
with  his  name.  He  is  steward  to  Olivia,  and  it  is  very  striking  to 
find  he  is  made  the  victim  of  a  plot,  turning  upon  a  cipher  or  letter. 
It  is  impossible  to  review  the  crass  imbecility  and  folly  connected 
with  much  Shakespearian  criticism,  without  thinking  of  Malvolio. 
Like  him,  whilst  constituting  themselves  the  stewards  of  Bacon^s 
art,  a  host  of  commentators  and  emendators  have  gone 
about  pluming  themselves,  with  the  literary  conceit,  they  could  hft 
the  veil  of  the  text,  and  that  they  could  interpret  this  art,  they  all 
the  while  being  shut  up  "  in  a  dark  house  of  ignorance.^'  It  was 
jtQpossible  such  secrets,  as  I  postulate  this  art  is  full  of,  could  be 


106  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

nakedly  published  in  an  age  (by  Bacon),  when  even  even  slight  dif- 
ferences in  matters  of  religion  were  entailing  persecution,  and  even 
death,  upon  their  holders.  Nor  in  any  age  can  certain  esoteric 
doctrines  be  revealed  to  the  multitude.  The  poet  knew  this,  and 
wrote : 

To  give  away  yourself  keeps  yourself  still, 

And  you  must  live  drawn  by  your  own  sweet  skill. 

{Sonnet  XVI.) 

It  was  only  by  art  aided  by  cipher,  the  poet  could  escape  the  malev- 
olence of  enemies,  and  by  bringing  his  poetry  into  harmony  with 
popular  judgment  disarm  and  delude  (by  depth  of  concealment) 
those  who  should  be  constituted  his  admirers,  stewards  or  lovers,  at 
whom  all  the  time  he  is  laughing,  for  the  reason  of  the  cipher  trick 
he  has  played  upon  them : 

They  that  have  power  to  hurt  and  will  do  none, 
That  do  not  do  the  thing  they  most  do  show, 
Who,  moving  others,  are  themselves  as  stone. 
Unmoved,  cold  and  to  temptation  slow, 
They  rightly  do  inherit  heaven's  graces 
And  husband  nature's  riches  from  expense ; 
They  are  the  lords  and  owners  of  their  faces, 
Others  but  stewards  of  their  excellence. 

{Sonnet  XGIV.) 

"  There  is  no  darkness  but  ignorance  in  which  we  are  more  puz- 
zled than  the  Egyptians  in  their  fog  "  is  applied  to  Malvolio,  in  the 
play.  His  madness  (which  he  denies  and  cannot  perceive)  belongs 
to  that  class  of  universal  insanity,  deplored  by  Bacon  to  one  of  his 
Sons  of  Wisdom,  and  which  Bacon  proposes  to  conform  to,  by  means 
of  art.  It  is  by  an  artifice  of  art,  based  upon  what  is  very  signifi- 
cant of  a  secret  cipher  (that  is,  by  fragments  of  the  alphabet,  which 
Malvolio  cannot  read),  the  steward  is  led  into  the  conceit  of  self-love, 
which  would  make  him  master  of  Olivia's  house  and  herself.  The 
whirligig  of  Time  brings  its  revenges,  and  the  moral  of  this  incident 
is  briefly  expressed  in  the  words  that  conclude  the  play : 

^''Gainst  knaves  and  thieves  men  shut  their  gate. 
For  the  rain  it  raineth  every  day." 

Here,  let  me  remark,  this  work  should  be  read  by  the  light  of  the 
Advancement  of  Learning.  It  is  only  by  turning  over  its  pages  the 
profound  student  will  gain  light.  To  the  ordinary  reader  this  work 
cannot  be  of  much  interest  or  assistance,  except  to  make  him,  per- 
haps, smile.   But  he  is  begged  to  remember,  I  have  been  studying  this 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  107 

problem  for  years,  and  he,  probably,  has  not  wasted  so  much  time 
over  it  (he  comments  inwardly).  So  be  it.  Posterity  must  judge, 
whether  I  am  right  and  whether  these  Plays  are  not  the  examples  of 
Bacon's  inductive  system,  to  be  interpreted  by  the  aid  of  his  great 
commentary— the  S^lva  Sylvarum! 


CHAPTER  y. 

The  Comedy  of  Errors. 

"It  dccidcth  also  the  controversies  between  Zemt  and  iSocrates,  and  their 
schools  and  successions  on  the  one  side,  who  placed  felicity  in  virtue  simply  or 
attended,  the  actions  and  exercises  whereof  do  chiefly  embrace  and  concern  society ; 
and  on  the  other  side  the  Cirenaics  and  Epicurceans,  who  placed  it  in  pleasure  and 
made  virtue  (as  it  is  used  in  some  Comedies  of  Errors,  wherein  the  mistress  and 
the  maid  change  habits)  to  he  hut  as  a  servant,  witlumt  which  pleasure  cannot  he  served 
and  attended.''^    (Advancement  of  Learning,  1605,  book  it.  p.  74.) 

The  object  of  this  chapter  is  to  briefly  point  out  how  Bacon,  in 
the  Comedy  of  Errors,  has  symbohzed  the  workings  of  the  Will  and 
Understanding,  in  accordance  with  the  emblems  of  Bacchus,  the 
vine, —  typical  of  passion  and  vice,  and  in  harmony  with  his  text  of 
the  Be  AugmentiSj  concerning  etJiic  and  logic,  and  also  in  parallel 
context  with  his  fable  of  the  Syrens  or  Pleasures.  This  history  of 
the  soul  is,  in  my  opinion,  entirely  borrowed  from  the  classical  Mys- 
teries known  as  the  Bacchic  and  Eleusinian.  Bacon  wrote 
his  collection  of  the  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients  with  direct  refer- 
ence to  the  plays.  The  fact  that  almost  every  piece  of  the  collection 
is  in  close  connection  with  the  origin  of  the  Greek  drama,  through 
the  Mysteries,  is  a  significant  fact  in  itself.  His  object,  I  submit, 
was  to  restore  the  ancient,  classical,  philosophical  and  religious  origins 
of  the  drama,  connected  with  agriculture,  through  a  system  of 
inductive  logic  applied  symbolically,  and  finding  its  reflection  in  his 
prose  writings,  as  ethic. 

One  object  Bacon  had  in  this  play,  I  maintain,  was  to  reduce 
ACTION  (which  he  identifies  with  Bacchus  as  passion,  affections  and 
appetites),  to  logic  and  understanding.  He,  therefore,  takes  the  chief 
emblem  of  Bacchus, —  the  vine  (which  stood  with  the  ancients  as 
the  emblem  of  vice  or  passion,  tvhen  unpruned  or  undressed),  to  illus- 
trate the  workings  of  "  unbridled  will,^^  as  the  cause  of  error  in  the 
understanding.  One  text  of  the  Comedy  of  Errors  is,  I  believe,  this 
passage : 

Adriana.    Thou  art  an  elm,  my  husband,  1  a  vine. 
Whose  weakness  married  to  thy  stronger  state 
Makes  me  with  thy  strength  to  communicate : 

108 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEMATUHE.  109 

If  ought  possess  thee  from  me  it  is  dross, 
Usurping  ivy,  briar  or  idle  moss,  * 
Who,  all  for  want  of  pruning,  with  intrusion, 
Infect  thy  sap,  and  live  on  thy  confusion. 

(Act  ii.  2,  Comedy  of  Errors. ) 
Bacon  writes : 

''  The  third  example  of  philosophy,  according  to  ancient  para- 
bl'es  in  morality.  Of  passion,  according  to  the  fable  of  Diony^sus. " 
(p.  126,  lib.  2,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.)  *' He  invented 
the  planting  and  dressing  of  vines;  the  making  and  use  of  wine." 
(lb.  p.  126.)  "  The  inventing  of  the  vine  is  a  wise  parable,  for 
every  affection  is  very  quick  and  witty  in  finding  out  that  which 
nourisheth  and  cherisheth  it;  and  of  all  things  known  to  men,  wine 
is  most  powerful  and  efficacious  to  excite  and  inflame  passions ;  of 
what  kind  soever;  as  being  in  a  sort  a  common  incentive  to  them 
all.''     (lb.  p.  128.) 

Now,  the  vine  was  always  trained  upon  the  elm  in  Italy,  which 
the  author  of  the  passage  quoted  well  knew.  Virgil's  first  Georgic, 
dedicated  to  Bacchus  and  Ceres,  opens  almost  with  the  words : 

Ulmisque  adjungere  Yitis  conveniat  (line  2.) 

The  term  married  trees  was  a  classical  expression,  used  gener- 
ally with  direct  reference  to  the  vine  and  elm : 

"  Aut  si  forte  eadem  est  ulmo  conjuncta  marito. " 

{Catullus  de  Vite.) 

' '  Nee  melius  teneris  junguntur  vitibus  ulmi. "  {Martial,  lib.  iv. ) 

"  At  si  tenerum  ulmum  maritaveris  novam  sufferet ; 
Si  vetustam  vitem  applicaveris,  conjugem  necabit;  ita 
Sibi  pares  esse  setate  et  viribus  arbores,  vitesque  convenit." 

{Columella,  lib.  v.,  cap.  v.) 

"  Stratus  humi  palmes  viduas  desiderat  ulmos. "  {Juvenal,  sat.  8.) 

All  this  was  well  know  to  Bacon.    He  writes  : 

"  And  in  France  the  grapes  that  make  the  wine,  grow  upon  the 
low  vines  bound  to  small  stakes.  It  is  true  that  in  Italy  and  other 
countries,  where  they  have  hotter  sun,  they  raise  them  upon  elms.^^ 
(Ex.  p.  432,  Sylva  Sylvarum.) 

In  the  Mysteries  of  Bacchus,  the  vine  being  his  chief  emblem 
(thus  a  type  for  wine  and  the  passions  excited  by  it),  the  pruning  and 
dressing  of  the  vine,  became  a  metaphor,  morally  applied  to  self- 
restraint  and  to  vice.  The  Latin  word  vitium,  or  vice,  was  derived, 
(as  I  already  have  remarked,)  from  vitis,  a  vine.  In  a  passage 
already  cited  from  Cicero,  it  may  be  seen  he  employs  the  pruning  of 


110  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

the  vine  to  illustrate  ethic  or  morality.    Adriana  exclaims  in  context 
with  her  metaphor  of  the  vine : 

Thou  art  an  elm,  my  husband,  I  a  vine. 

Who,  all  for  want  of  pruning,  with  intrusion. 
Infect  thy  sap  and  live  on  thy  confusion. 

Passions  confuse  and  illaqueate  the  understanding,  and  are  one  of 
the  great  causes  of  error,  a  theme  Bacon  is  never  tired  of  inculcating 
in  his  Instauration.  The  mind  is  macerated  in  the  affections,  and 
prejudges,  not  according  to  what  is  true,  but  to  what  it  rather  likes. 

At  the  commencement  of  the  fifth  book  of  the  De  Augmentis, 
Bacon  writes :  "  The  Will  of  man  and  the  Understanding  of  man  are 
TWINS  hy  birth. "  It  may  be  noticed  the  Antipholi  and  their  servants, 
the  two  Dromios,  (of  Syracuse  and  Ephesus, )  are  twins.  Bacon  writes 
again :  "  That  the  mind  hath  over  the  body  that  commandment  which 
the  Lord  hath  over  a  bond-man,"  (lb.  book  v.  218.)  Both  the 
servants  of  the  two  Antipholus'  are  slaves  or  bondsmen.  In  the 
two  books  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning,  1605,  Bacon  writes: 
"  The  knowledge  which  respecteth  the  faculties  of  the  mind  of 
man  is  of  two  sorts:  the  one  respecting  the  Understanding  and 
Reason,  and  the  other  his  will,  appetites  and  affections.  Quales 
decet  esse  sororum  (whom  it  behooves  to  be  sisters)."  (Book  ii.) 
Now  Adriana  and  Luciana  are  not  only  two  sisters,  but  are 
drawn  in  direct  contrast  to  each  other,  as  revolt  of  will  and  submis- 
sion of  will,  evidently  with  an  ethical  purpose  in  each  delineation. 
In  discussing  duty  to  husbands  Luciana  exclaims : 

Luciana.    0,  know  he  is  the  bridle  of  your  will. 
Adriana.    There's  none  but  asses  will  be  bridled  so. 

(Act  i.  2.) 

This  is  another  text  illustrating  the  play,  pointing  out  the  un- 
pruned  vine  is  revolted  will,  which,  fastening  upon  Antipholus  of 
Syracuse,  will  transform  him  into  the  ass  Adriana  satirises. 
Directly  on  the  heels  of  the  passage  on  the  vine  already  cited : 

Bromio  S.    I  am  transformed,  master,  am  I  not  ? 

Ant.  8.    I  think  thou  art  in  mind,  and  so  am  I. 

Bromio  S.    Nay,  master,  both  in  my  mind  and  in  my  shape. 

Ant.  S.    Thou  hast  thine  own  form. 

Bromio  S.    No,  I  am  an  ape. 

Luciana.    If  thou  art  changed  to  aught,  His  to  an  ass. 

Bromio  S.    'Tis  true;  she  rides  me  and  I  long  for  grass. 
'Tis  so,  I  am  an  ass;  else  it  could  never  be 
But  I  should  know  her  as  weU  as  she  knows  me.      (Act  ii.  2.) 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  Ill 

"  Apelles  drew  a  picture  of  the  life  of  man  and  the  abuse  of  drunk- 
enness. In  the  first  place,  he  painted  a  garden  with  a  very  pleasant 
arbor  in  it,  which  was  embellished  with  herbs  and  flowers  of  all 
sorts.  At  the  entrance  to  this  garden  there  stood  a  great  gate  on 
the  right  hand,  the  way  and  passage  whereof  was  very  delightful 
and  much  frequented.  On  the  other  side  there  was  another  little 
door,  very  straight  and  narrow,  to  pass  in  and  out  of,  which  had  a 
sharp  and  difiQcult  way  thereto,  all  covered  with  bushes,  brambles 
and  thorns,  and  that  way  seemed  very  little  frequented.  Before  the 
first  gate,  there  were  goodly  tents  erected,  and  before  them  stood 
tables,  loaded  with  viands  and  goodly  things.  At  the  entrance  of 
an  arbor  sat  a  woman  in  garments  like  a  queen,  with  a  crown  of 
young  vine  upon  her  head,  and  she  was  intoxicated.  She  was 
attended  by  three  waiting-maids  who  were  respectively  called  Folly, 
Madness  and  Luxury.  This  company  were  guarded  and  environed 
(as  by  hedges  and  bushes),  with  bears,  bulls,  goats,  great  asses, 
horses  and  apes,  and  all  other  kinds  of  beasts,  that  (of  living  men) 
had  been  metamorphosed  into  such  monsters,  after  they  had  drunk 
of  the  wine  from  the  hand  of  the  lady,  out  of  a  cup  which  one  of 
her  handmaids  called  slothfulness.  When  they  entered  first  to  her 
they  were  all  men,  and  so  continued  (for  some  time)  in  their  human 
shape,  but  when  they  had  thoroughly  tasted  of  her  drink,  they  lost 
their  true  forms  and  were  transformed  into  beasts. "  {Tlie  Treasury 
of  Ancient  and  Modern  TimeSj  book  vi.  ch.  xxvi.  Translated  out 
of  the  Spanish  of  Pedro  Mexio  and  Francesco  Sansovino.  laggard, 
1613,  London.) 

Socrates,  in  Plato's  PhcBdo,  writes : 

*'  For  instance,  those  who  have  given  themselves  up  to  gluttony, 
wantonness  and  drinking,  and  have  put  no  restraint  on  themselves, 
will  probably  be  clothed  in  the  forms  of  asses  and  brutes  of  that 
kind."    (p.  85,  Bohn's  edition,  Plato  Gary  vol.  i.) 

It  may  be  actually  perceived  the  passage  quoted  gives  these  three 
animals.  Dromio  of  Syracuse  compares  himself  to  the  horse,  ape  and 
ass.  Archbishop  Warburton,  in  his  Divine  Legation  of  Moses, 
points  out  that  the  transformation  of  Apuleius  into  an  ass,  (pictured 
in  his  fable  of  the  Golden  Ass),  represents  that  he  had  been  living  a 
vicious  and  bestial  life,  and  that  Apuleius  only  regained  his  proper 
shape  by  initiation  into  the  Mysteries.  It  may  be  noticed,  the 
passage  cited,  recalls  the  transformation  of  Bottom  into  an  ass,  in  the 
Dream.    Very  remarkable  it  is  to  find,  tJie  other  plant  sacred  to 


112  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

Bacchus,  the  ivy,  introduced  in  direct  context  with  Bottom's  sleep 
in  the  arms  of  Titania : 

Titania.    Sleep  thou,  and  I  will  wind  the  in  my  arms. 
Fairies,  be  gone,  and  be  always  away. 
So  doth  the  woodbine  the  sweet  honeysuckles 
Gently  entwist ;  the  female  ivy  so 
Enrings  the  barky  fingers  of  the  elm.     (Act  iv.  1.) 

Now  in  the  plays,  ivy  is  always  treated  as  Bacon  describes  it, — 
that  is,  as  a  parasite  of  a  deadly  nature,  killing,  strangling  and 
overrunning  whatever  it  fastens  upon. 

"  Neither  is  it  without  a  mystery,  that  the  ivy  was  sacred  to 
Bacchus;  the  application  holds  two  ways.  First,  in  that  the  ivy 
remains  green  in  winter;  secondly,  in  that  it  creeps  along,  em- 
braceth  and  advanceth  itself  over  so  many  diverse  bodies  as  trees, 
walls,  edifices. '^ 

''  Secondly,  every  predominant  affection  in  man's  soul,  like  the 
ivy,  doth  compass  and  confine  all  human  actions  and  counsels, 
neither  can  you  find  anything  so  immaculate  and  inconcerned,  which 
affections  have  not  tainted  and  clinched,  as  it  were,  with  their  ten- 
drils."   (p.  129,  Advancement,  1640.) 

It  seems  to  me  the  elm  stands  for  the  soul,  ivy  for  the  predomi- 
nant affbctions  which  clinch,  as  it  were,  the  soul,  and  set  it  to  sleep 
in  the  body,  killing  and  stifling  it  as  the  parasite  often  kills  the  elm. 
In  the  second  part  of  King  Henry  IV.  (col.  169)  Falstaff" is  addressed 

thus: 

Answer,  thou  dead  Elm,  answer. 

This  has  puzzled  commentators,  but  by  the  theory  I  propound, 
and  which  is  supported  by  ancient  classical  lore,  it  is  perfectly  in 
consonance  with  the  idea  of  a  man,  who,  like  Falstaff,  had  ruined 
his  body  and  soul,  by  overindulgence  in  wine  and  passion,^  both  of 
which  Bacon  connotes  with  the  vine  and  ivy,  both  of  which  are 
peculiar  to  elm  trees.  Bacon  writes :  ''  But  it  was  ordained  that 
this  winding  ivy  of  a  Plantagenet  should  kill  the  tree  itself. "  (Bacon's 
History  of  King  Henry  the  VII.)  This  passage  finds  its  perfect 
parallel  in  Prospero's  mouth : 

"  That  now  he  was 
The  ivy  which  had  hid  my  princely  trunk 
And  sucked  my  verdure  out  onH. " 

{Tempest,  Act  i.  1.) 

The  elm  tree  held  a  peculiarly  recondite,  and  mystic  symbolism 

with  the  Ancients.    It  was  sacred  to  Diana,  who  Ovid  in  his  meta- 

1  Sir  Walter  Raleigh :  "It  were  better  for  a  man  to  be  subject  to  any  vice  than 
to  drunkenness,  for  it  dulleth  the  spirits  UTid  destroyeth  the  body  as  ivy  doth  the  old 
tree." 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  113 

morphoses  calls  Titania.  {Metamorphoses  iii.  173;  see  Keightley 's 
Fairy  Mythology.)  Alias  demde  arbores  praeclarae  Dianae  s.icrae 
habebantur,  velut  Ephesia?  antiquissimum  sacellum  ulmi  aut  fagi 
truncus  erat."  (p.  54  De  JDian^e  Antiquissima,  Glaus,  vide  Guhl 
Ephesiaca,  p.  78  et  seq.)  Bat  it  is  in  Virgil's  sixth  book  that  we  dis- 
cover the  elm  tree  of  the  Mysteries,  the  tree  of  false  dreams  placed 
on  the  threshold  of  hell,  a  symbol  of  the  delusions  and  vain 
dreams  of  the  soul  arising  from  our  material  nature  : 

In  medio  ramos  annosaque  bracchia  pandit, 
Ulmus  opaca,  ingens ;  quam  sedem  Somnia  vulgo 
Vana  tenere  ferunt,  foliisque  sub  omnibus  hcerent. 

(282  iEneid,  vi.  book.) 
Full  in  the  midst  a  spreading  elm  displayed 
His  aged  arms,  and  cast  a  mighty  shade, 
Each  trembhng  leaf  with  some  light  vision  teems, 
And  heaves  impregnated  with  airy  dreams. 

It  may  indeed  be  asked,  whether  Bottom's  vain  dreams,  spring- 
ing out  of  his  vanity  and  desire  to  play  the  lion's  part,  and  hold  up 
his  tiny  lanthorn  to  Nature,  are  not  in  touch  with  the  hint  we  are 
given  of  the  elm  tree?  That  is  to  say,  is  it  not  possible  Titania  is 
a  picture  of  the  invisible  magical  powers  of  passive  Nature,  which 
lull  and  overpower  the  soul  of  man,  and  make  his  efforts  to  compre- 
hend or  explain  nature  ridiculous?  It  is  the  deformity  of  the  soul 
which  is  pictured  in  Bottom's  transformation  into  an  ass.  It  is  the 
body  which,  like  the  ivy,  overpowers,  stifles  and  strangles  the  soul 
and  the  intellectual  comprehension  of  things;  but  the  body  is  part  of 
Nature,  that  is  matter,  in  which  the  soulis  bound.  Man  ismarried  to 
Nature,  and  in  his  ignorance  of  the  secret  and  magical  powers  which 
environ  him,  is  very  much  in  the  position  of  Bottom  in  Titania's 
arms, — he  is,  in  short,  asleep,  an  ass  when  he  goes  about  to  explain 
what  is  beyond  him,  and  is  fooled  by  just  those  powers  of  Natural 
Magic,  which  invisibly  override  the  entire  action  of  the  p^.ay, — the 
Fairies.  I  only  introduce  all  this  in  order  to  point  out,  there  is  an 
evident  connection  between  the  Dream  and  the  Comedy  of  Errors. 
Antipholus  of  Syracuse  exclaims  (in  context  with  the  passage  of 
the  Vine  married  to  the  Elm). 

''To  me  she  speaks;  she  moves  me  for  her  theme: 
What,  tvas  I  married  to  her  in  my  dream  f 
Or  sleep  I  now  and  think  I  hear  all  this? 
What  error  drives  our  eyes  and  ears  amiss? '' 

(Act  ii.  2.) 


114  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE. 

The  student  will  notice  the  expression  ^^  my  dream,^^  "not  a 
dream.  ^'  Bottom  in  his  transformation  is  subject  to /ames.  Com- 
pare the  Comedy  of  Errors  : 

Bromio  S.    0,  for  my  beads !  I  cross  me  for  a  sinner. 
This  is  the  fairy  land :  0  spite  of  spites ! 
We  talk  with  goblins,  owls  and  sprites : 
If  we  obey  them  not,  this  will  ensue, 
They'll  suck  our  breath  or  pinch  us  black  and  blue. 

(Actii.  2.) 

Antipholus  of  Syracuse  exclaims  to  Luciana : 

''  0,  train  me  not,  sweet  mermaid,  with  thy  note, 
To  drown  me  in  thy  sistefs  flood  of  tears  ; 

Sing,  siren,  for  thyself  and  I  will  dote. 
Spread  o^er  the  silver  waves  thy  golden  hairs. 

And  as  a  bed  I'll  take  them  and  there  lie, 
And  in  that  glorious  supposition  think 

He  gains  by  death  that  hath  such  means  to  die."  (iii.  2.) 

And  again,  further  on  in  the  same  scene,  he  adds  — 
"  I^ll  stop  my  ears  against  the  mermaiWs  song." 

Staunton  considers  that  in  these  passages  the  allusion  is 
obviously  to  the  long- current  opinion,  that  the  Siren,  or  Mermaid, 
decoyed  mortals  to  destruction  by  the  witchery  of  her  songs. 

This  is  a  most  excellent  illustration  of  Bacon's  fable  of  the  Sirens 
or  Pleasures  ( Wisdom  of  the  Ancients),  and  supports  very  strongly 
my  theory  of  the  play.  Adrian  a  is  accordingly  the  Siren  or 
Pleasures,  which  Bacon  describes  as  follows : 

"  The  fable  of  the  Sirens  is,  in  a  vulgar  sense,  justly  enough 
explained  of  the  pernicious  incentives  to  pleasure;  but  the  ancient 
mythology  seems  to  us  like  a  vintage  ill-pressed  and  trod;  for 
though  something  has  been  drawn  from  it,  yet  all  the  more  excellent 
parts  remain  behind  in  the  grapes  that  are  untouched. " 

'^  These  sirens  resided  in  certain  pleasant  islands,  and  when, 
from  their  watch  tower,  they  saw  any  ship  approaching,  they  first 
detained  the  sailors  by  their  music,  then,  enticing  them  to  shore, 
destroyed  them. 

'*  Their  singing  was  not  of  one  and  the  same  kind,  but  they 
adapted  their  tunes  exactly  to  the  nature  of  each  person,  in  order  to 
captivate  and  secure  him. 

"  Two  different  remedies  were  inventedto  protect  persons  against 
them,  the  one  by  Ulysses,  the  other  by  Orpheus.  Ulysses  com- 
manded his  associates  to  stop  their  ears  close  with  wax.^^  ( Wisdom 
of  the  Ancients.) 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  115 

The  reader  cannot  fail  to  perceive  the  parallels  in  all  this  to  the 
Comedy  of  Errors.    Antipholus  of  Syracuse,  exclaiming  : 
''  I'll  stop  my  ears  against  the  mermaid's  song." 
Bacon  continues : 

"  And  so  destructive  had  they  been,  that  these  islands  of  the 
Sirens  appeared,  to  a  very  great  distance,  white  with  the  bones  of 
their  unburied  captives. " 

Now  mark,  Antipholus  of  Syracuse,  and  his  servant,  Droraio  of 
Syracuse,  are  presented  in  the  play  as  arriving  in  a  ship  at  Ephesus. 
They  are  represented,  in  the  last  scene  of  the  fourth  act,  as  seeking 
safety  by  flight  on  board  their  ship,  from  Adriana  and  her  friends, 
whom  they  term  witches  : 

Ant.  S.    I  see  these  witches  are  afraid  of  swords. 

Dro.  S.    She  that  would  be  your  wife  now  ran  from  you. 

Ant.  S.     Come  to  the  Centaur ;  fetch  om'  stuff  from  thence. 
Ilong  that  we  were  safe  and  sound  aboard. 

Dro.  S.  Faith,  stay  here  this  night;  they  will  surely  do  us 
no  harm ;  you  saw  they  speak  us  fair,  give  us  gold ;  methinks  they 
are  such  a  gentle  nation  that,  hut  for  the  mountain  of  mad  flesh  that 
claims  marriage  of  me,  I  could  find  in  my  heart  to  stay  here  still  and 
turn  witch. 

Ant.  S.     I  will  not  stay  to-night  for  all  the  town. 
Therefore  away,  to  get  our  stuff  aboard. 

We  can  perceive  the  poet's  intention  in  the  symbolical  hint, 
"  mountain  ofmadflesh/^  which  Dromiois  depicted  flying  from,  and 
which  claims  marriage  with  him.  As  to  this  St.  Augustine  writes  : 

"  What  is  said  to  Cain  about  his  sin,  or  about  the  vicious  concu- 
piscence of  his  flesh,  is  here  said  of  the  woman  who  had  sinned ;  and 
we  are  to  understand  that  the  husband  is  to  rule  his  wife  as  the  soul 
rules  the  flesh. " 

It  may  almost  be  imagined  Bacon,  in  opening  this  fable  witli  a 
refei-ence  to  vintage  and  grapes,  is  thinking  of  the  vine,  to  which 
Adriana  is  compared  (as  being  trained  to  the  elm,  her  husband), 
which  union  Virgil  calls  "  married  trees^^^  in  his  Bucolics;  that  is,  the 
flesh  and  the  sotd  are  compared  to  wife  and  husband. 

1  Sic  et  vitis  coniiubiuiii  et  maritationem  cum  arboribus  passim  celebrant  poetos 
et  scriptores  res  rusticse.  Inter  quos  Columella,  (lib.  5,  cap.  6,)  cui  ulmus  pro 
Mare  est  vitis  Femina.  Ex  quo  conjugio  feracissima  proveniat  uvarum  soboles. 
(Vide  Juven.  saty.  8:) 

Stratus'  bumi  palmes  viduas  desiderat  ulmos. 

Quasi  vites  languidse  sint  et  minus  fructiferse,  si  arceantur  a  complexu  nlmorvm, 
quas  amant.  Qnaiiqiiam  vites  in  Campauo  agro,  non  tam  ulmis.  quam  papulis 
nubere  dicantur  Plinio,  lib.  14  c.  i.     {Pancirollias,  p.  59.) 

' '  And  so  both  the  union  and  marriage  of  vines  with  trees  the  poets  and  writers 
on  agriculture  celebrate  on  all  sides.    Amongst  whom  Columella  (lib.  5,  ch.  6),  who 


116  THE  COL  UMB  US  OF  LITER  A  T  URE. 

In  the  term  witch,  applied  to  Adriana,  we  may  perceive 
Bacon's  mind  again,  when  he  describes,  "love  as  a  witch.^'  St. 
Augustine  writes  : 

"  That  there  were  reported  to  be  certain  witches  in  Thessaly, 
who  had  the  power  of  transforming  men  into  animals,  as  horses  and 

asses." 

This  he  introduces  in  touch  with  Apuleius. 
In  Virgil  we  read : 

Me  tamen  urit  amor  ;  quis  enim  modus  adsit  amori  ? 
Ah,  Corydon,  Corydon,  quae  te  dementia  cepit ! 
Semiputata  tibi  frondosa  vitis  in  ulmo  est. 

{Eclogue,  ii.  70.) 

This  metaphor  applied  to  Corydon's  folly,  in  giving  way  to 
love  and  its  madness,  shows  he  is  in  the  condition  of  the  vine 
unpruned.  "  You  have  left  (your)  vine  unpruned  on  the  elm,  ivhich 
itself  requires  to  have  its  superfluous  foliage  dipt  off. "  This  proves 
that  in  Virgil's  time,  virtue  and  morality,  were  compared  to  the 
pruning  of  exuberant  vines,  running  to  leaf,  and  not  to  fruit. 
Servius  states  that  there  was  a  superstitious  belief  that  any  one  who, 
in  sacrificing,  used  wine  made  from  unpruned  vines,  was  seized  with 
madness. 

There  was  also  a  law  of  Numa,  "  Diis  ex  imputata  vite  ne  libando, " 
i.e.,"  that  libations  were  not  to  be  made  to  the  gods  from  unpruned 
vines,"  which  suggests  this  image  stood  for  purification  of  morals, 
or  the  agriculture  of  the  soul,  applied  probably  typically  in  the 
Mysteries  of  Bacchus.  But,  to  return  to  the  quotation,  it  is  plain, 
from  the  metaphor  applied  by  Adriana  to  Antipholus,  ("  and  live  on 
thy  confusion,^')  the  poet  signifies  the  confusion  and  havoc  the 
passions  and  appetites  create,  typified  by  wine.  Wine  and  love  are 
almost  interchangeable  words.  The  proverb  runs,  "  without  Ceres 
and  Bdcchus,  (bread  and  wine),  Venus  cannot  be  nourished." 

In  Lucian's  Trip  to  the  Moon,  we  read  of  some  vines  that  were 
half  women : 

"  We  passed  the  river  in  a  part  of  it  which  was  fordable,  and  a 
little  farther  on  met  with  a  most  wonderful  species  of  vine.  The 
bottoms  of  them,  that  touched  the  earth,  were  green  and  thick, 

makes  the  elm  the  male  or  husband^  and  the  vine  female  or  wife.     From  which  union 
arises  most  fruitfully  the  progeny  of  grapes." 

Et  te  Bacche,  tuas  nubentem  junget  ad  ulmos  (Manil  5,  238). 

This  line  shows  Bacchus  was  closely  connected  with  the  elm. 

All  this  proves  the  extraordinary  classical  attainments  of  the  author  of  the 

plays,  and  is  almost  prohibitory  to  the  Shakespeare  authorship. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE  117 

and  all  the  upper  part  most  beautiful  women,  with  the  limbs  per- 
fect from  the  waist,  only  that  from  the  tops  of  the  fingers,  branches 
sprung  out,  full  of  grapes,  just  as  Daphne  is  represented  as  turned 
into  a  tree,  when  Apollo  laid  hold  on  her.  On  the  head,  likewise, 
instead  of  hair  they  had  leaves  and  tendrils.  When  we  came  up  to 
them  they  addressed  us,  some  in  the  Lydian  tongue,  some  in  the 
Indian,  but  most  of  them  in  Greek.  They  would  not  suffer  us  to 
taste  their  grapes,  but,  when  anybody  attempted  it,  cried  out  as  if 
they  were  hurt.''     (p.  80,  Francklin's  Transl) 

It  is  very  certain  Lucian's  romance  was  not  all  drawn  from  his 
imagination,  but  was  inspired  by  a  great  deal  of  knowledge  bor- 
rowed from  the  Mysteries.  This  we  may  gather  from  his  introduc- 
tion of  Endymion,  with  whose  history  divination  by  dreams  was 
closely  connected.  The  translator,  from  whom  I  quote,  in  a  foot- 
note writes : 

"  Lucian,  we  see,  has  founded  his  history  on  matter  of  fact. 
Endymion,  we  all  know,  was  so  handsome  that  the  moon,  who  saw 
him  sleeping  on  Mount  Latmos,  fell  in  love  with  him.  Lucian 
makes  him  Emperor  of  the  Moon."     (p.  82-83.) 

It  is  the  deformity  of  the  soul,  that  is  pictured  in  the  transforma- 
tion of  Bottom,  — it  is  the  deformity  of  the  soul  confounded  with  the 
body{oT  other  self),  which  is  represented  in  the  claiming  of  Antipho- 
lus  of  Syracuse  by  Adriana,  as  her  husband,  in  place  of  her  real  hus- 
band.   See  how  this  is  hinted  at  in  the  first  act : 

Ant.  S.    They  say  this  town  is  full  of  cozenage. 
As  nimble  jugglers  that  deceive  the  eye, 
Dark-working  sorcerer's  that  change  the  mind, 
Soul-killing  witches  that  deform  the  body, 
And  many  such  like  liberties  of  sin. 

(Act  i.) 

Adriana  is  just  such  a  ^^soul-killing  witch,^^  as  Vice, —  repre- 
senting, the  "  Will  as  passions  and  appetites,  fastening  upon  the  soul 
(Antipholus  of  Syracuse),  and  transforming  the  body  into  the  likeness 
of  a  beast, —  hence  Dromio  of  Syracuse  declares  he  is  transformed 
into]an  ass !  —  For  the  body  is  the  servant  of  the  soul  if  properly  gov- 
erned, as  a  horse  is  led  by  a  bridle,  but  if  these  are  capsized  or 
reversed,  the  master  or  soul  become  identified  with  the  servant 
(the  body),  and  we  may  thus  understand  the  author's  subtlety  in 
ascribing  the  transformation  to  Dromio.  My  theory  is  that  Dromio, 
as  attendant  and  servant  to  Antipholus  of  Syracuse,  signifies  virtue 
as  soul,  overridden  by  vice.  In  fact  these  two,  as  master  and 
servant,  are  soul  and  body  in  action  with  virtue  and  vice,  portrayed 
by  the  sisters  Luciana  and  Adriana. 


118  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

The  student  will  mark  the  simile  "  bridle  of  your  will, "  applied 
by  Luciana  to  the  husband  of  Adriana,  ( Antipholus  of  Ephesus, )  whom 
I  have  maintained  is  a  philosophical  personified  abstract  of  the  bet- 
ter angel  or  spirit,  as  reason  and  understanding.  "  Vice  knows  no 
bridle  to  the  will/'  and  therefore  recognizes  no  such  person,  as 
reason,  its  lawful  master  or  husband.  Adriana  exclaims : 
There's  none  but  asses  will  be  bridled  so. 

It  has  been  truly  often  remarked,  in  seeking  liberty  we  find 
bondage,  for  in  the  revolt  of  the  will,  as  vice  (pictured  in  Adriana), 
we  lay  ourselves  under  the  subjection  of  our  worse  half, —  the  body, 
and  Adriana  is  thus  the  cause  of  the  transformation  metaphorical  of 
Antipholus  and  his  attendant.  Observe  in  the  following  passage 
how  the  direct  contrast  to  Adriana,  (submission  to  reason  and  grace, 
as  DIVINE  WISDOM,)  is  sketched  in  this  portrait  of  Luciana  : 

Ant.  S.  Sweet  mistress, —  what  your  uame  is  else,  I  know  not, 

Nor  by  what  wonder  you  do  hit  of  mine, — 
Less  in  your  knowledge  and  your  grace  you  show  not 

Than  our  earth's  wonder,  more  than  earth  divine. 
Teach  me,  dear  creature,  how  to  think  and  speak; 

Lay  open  to  my  earthy-gross  conceit, 
Smother'd  in  error's,  feeble,  shallow,  weak, 

The  folded  meaning  of  your  words'  deceit. 
Against  my  soul's  pure  truth  why  labor  you 
To  make  it  wander  in  an  unknown  field? 
Are  you  a  god?  would  you  create  me  new  f 
Transform  me  then,  and  to  your  power  Til  yield. 

(Act  iii.) 
Mark  the  hint  of  the  regeneration,  or  regenerated  man  of  the 
second  birth:  "  Would  you  create  me  newf  "  It  is,  indeed,  by  sub- 
mission of  the  will  to  reason,  we  become  transformed  and  recognize 
Luciana  as  virtue  in  place  of  Adriana  or  vice.  This  was  taught  in 
the  Mysteries  and  was  called  the  second  birth ;  that  is,  the  recogni- 
tion of  the  godlike  in  our  souls,  led  and  governed  by  wisdom, — the 
heavenly  creative  virgin  of  the  Hermetic  school.  Observe  how  in 
the  following  passage,  the  subjection  of  the  mind  to  the  body,  is 
hinted  at  with  regard  to  one  particular  vice,  which  finds  its  reflec- 
tion in  every  line  : 

Enter  Dromio  of  Syracuse. 
Ant.  S.    Why,  how  now,  Dromio !  where  runn'st  thou  so  fast  ? 
Dro.  S.    Do  you  know  me,  sir  ?  am  I  Dromio  ?  am  I  your  man? 
am  I  myself? 

Ant.  8.    Thou  art  Dromio,  thou  art  my  man,  thou  art  thyself. 
Dro.  S.    I  am  an  ass,  I  am  a  woman^s  man,  and  besides  myself. 
Ant.  S.    What  woman's  man  ?  and  how  besides  thyself? 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  119 

Dro.  S.  Marry,  sir,  besides  myself,  I  am  dae  to  a  woman  one 
that  claims  me,  one  that  haunts  me,  one  that  will  have  me. 

Ant.  S.    What  claim  lays  she  to  thee  ? 

Dro.  S.  Marry,  sir,  such  claim  as  you  would  lay  to  your  horse ; 
and  she  would  have  me  as  a  beast;  not  that,  I  being  a  beast,  she 
would  have  me;  but  that  she,  being  a  very  beastly  creature,  lays 
claim  to  me. 

Ant.  S.    What  is  she  ? 

Dro.  S.  A  very  reverent  body  :  ay,  such  a  one  as  a  man  may 
not  speak  of  without  he  say  '  Sir-reverence.'  I  have  but  lean  luck 
in  the  match,  and  yet  is  she  a  wondrous  fat  marriage. 

Ant.  S.    How  dost  thou  mean  a  fat  marriage  ? 

Dro.  S.  Marry,  sir,  she's  the  kitchen  wench  and  all  grease ;  and 
I  know  not  what  use  to  put  her  to  but  to  make  a  lamp  of  her  and 
run  from  her  by  her  own  light.  I  warrant,  her  rags  and  the  tallow 
in  them  will  burn  a  Poland  winter ;  if  she  lives  till  doomsday,  she'll 
burn  a  week  longer  than  the  whole  world. 

(Act  iii.) 

I  venture  humbly  to  maintain,  this  passage  is  applied  to  the  flesh. 
What  this  "  she  "  in  question  is,  may  be  answered  by  the  irony  of 
the  text  with  regard  to  the  implied  maxim  "  Beverence  the  body. " 
We  may  see  that  all  this  refers  to  the  passage  already  quoted,  in 
which  Adriana  fastens  as  a  vine  upon  the  sleeve  of  Antipholus  of 
Syracuse.  The  text  placed  by  me  in  italics  proves  this.  Vice  trans- 
forms men  into  beasts,  and  the  poet  would  hint  to  us  the  servant's 
reflections  upon  himself,  are  (I  make  bold  to  maintain)  reflections 
upon  his  master's  condition,  who  is  part  of  himself.  It  is  part  and 
parcel  of  the  regenerated  man  he  should  recognize  vice  and  flee  from 
it.  Dromio  is  so  pictured,  as  aghast  at  his  own  condition,  flying 
from  it  and  in  revolt  against  his  servitude  to  the  body.  The  only 
way  to  escape  vice  is  to  make  a  lamp  of  it  and  set  it  up  as  a  caution 
for  our  escape.  But  we  may  see  in  the  passage  I  adduce  a  perfect 
reflection  of  Cicero,  who  writes : 

''Can  I  call  the  man  free  whom  a  woman  governs,  to  whom  she 
gives  laws,  lays  down  directions,  orders  and  forbids  what  to  her 
seems  fit,  while  he  can  deny  and  dare  refuse  nothing  that  she  com- 
mands? Does  she  ask?  He  must  give.  Does  she  call?  He  must 
come.  Does  she  order  him  off?  He  must  vanish.  Does  she 
threaten  ?  He  must  tremble.  For  my  part,  I  call  such  a  fellow, 
though  he  may  have  been  born  in  the  noblest  family,  not  only  a 
slave,  but  a  most  abject  slave." 

Sir  Thomas  Brown  writes : 

"  To  well  manage  our  affections,  and  wild  horses  of  Plato  are  the 
highest  circenses;  and  the  noblest  digladiation  is  in  the  theatre  of 
ourselves ;  for  therein  our  inward  antagonists,  not  only  like  common 


120  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE, 

gladiators,  with  ordinary  weapons  and  downright  blows  make  at  us, 
but  also  like  retiary  and  laqueary  combatants,  with  nets,  frauds 
and  entanglements  fall  upon  us.''  {Christian  Morals,  part  i.  ch.  2.) 

The  names  of  the  twin  Protagonists  of  the  play  (which  are 
original,  and  not  borrowed  from  Plautus)  bear  out,  in  a  certain 
degree,  my  hypothesis  of  the  symbolical  intention  of  the  author. 
In  Plato,  and  even  in  Cicero,  we  frequently  find  the  action  of 
ethic,  as  self- discipline,  compared  to  a  theatre,  wherein  we  are  com- 
batants with  ourselves,  and  where  reason  is  a  gladiator  at  strife 
with  the  temptations  of  the  body.  This  simile  of  circuses  and  the 
amphitheatre,  was  borrowed  from  the  discipline  of  the  rider  over  his 
horse  {as  a  bridle  to  passion),  and  in  The  Lesser  Hippias  of  Plato 
we  find  Socrates  employing  this  metaphor.  The  names  of  the  twin 
servants  in  the  Comedy  of  Errors  are  each  Dromio,  which  word  has 
an  affinity  to  Dromos,  or  the  Circuses. 

"These  are  the  exercises  of  the  understanding;  these  are  the 
race-courses  of  the  mind,"  writes  Plato  in  his  treatise  on  old  age 
(chap.  xi.  p.  234,  Three  Books  of  Offices,  Bohn,  1850),  referring  to 
the  Olympic  festival,  at  which  the  contentions  between  the  different 
schools  of  morality  and  philosophy  took  place.  In  the  Lesser  Hippias 
of  Plato  Socrates  exclaims:  "  Happy  is  the  situation  of  your  mind, 
Hippias,  that,  as  often  as  the  Olympic  festival  returns,  you  can  pro- 
ceed to  the  temple  with  a  soul  so  full  of  alacrity  and  hope. "  Soc- 
rates borrows  the  simile  of  runners  in  the  races  to  illustrate  good 
and  bad  men : 

"Which  horse  is  it  best  to  be  the  owner, —  whether  of  a 
horse  with  such  a  kind  of  temper  and  spirit,  as  may  serve  his  rider 
in  riding  ill  purposely,  and  through  choice  only,  or  of  a  horse  upon 
which  his  rider  must  of  necessity  ride  ill  '^  "    {Lesser  Hippias.) 

It  is,  indeed,  curious  to  find  how  readily  the  Greek  word  dpo/ioi, 
with  its  meaning  of  a  racecourse,  running,  flight  and  escape,  seems  to 
be  reechoed  in  the  running  and  flight  scene  of  Dromio  of  Syracuse. 
Af)op,oi  is  derived  from  dpajusiv,  which  is  the  aorist  (second  imp.) 
of  the  verb  rpExoo,  which  means,  metaphorically  applied,  {dycSvai 
dpajusiv  TtEpi  iavrov),  to  run  a  race  for  one's  life  or  safety,  (as  Tpex^iv 
TtEpi  rifi  ip^xv^})  to  run  a  race  for  one's  life,  or  soul,  {i^vxrj  means 
the  soul  of  man  as  opposed  to  his  body.)  Any  struggle  or 
contest  was  called  generally  ayoov,  (as  ayoov  TtEpv  rrji  t'^xv'^y) 
and  was  particularly  applied  to  the  great  national  games  held  at 
Olympia.  Hence  the  word  came  to  mean  a  wrestling  with  self,  as 
anguish;  or  even  agony  of  mind — {ay^^y^oc),  our  English  word 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  121 

being  derived  from  it,  and  thus  by  metaphor  the  contest  of  the 
spirit  with  the  body  for  victory,  borrowed  its  imagery  from  the  race- 
course and  amphitheatre.  The  name  Antipholus  is  probably  com- 
posed of  the  preposition  avn,  (which  means  opposed  to  or  against^) 
and  cpvXXdi,  which  means  the  leaves  and  foliage  of  a  tree.  (The 
verb  q)v\a66oOf  means  to  keep  watch,  to  guard  against.)  It  may 
be  observed  this  derivation  lends  itself  readily  to  our  theory  of 
morality,  or  ethic,  allied  to  the  pruning  of  vines. 

It  may  be  perceived  in  the  Comedy  of  Errors,  it  is  Dromio  of 
Syracuse,  the  servant  to  Antipholus  of  Syracuse,  who  is  really  the 
virtuous  character.  It  is  he  who  is  presented  fleeing  from  vice,  and 
commenting  upon  his  own  transformation  into  an  ass,  and  bewailing 
his  condition  with  regard  to  the  temptations  he  and  his  master  are 
exposed  to.  This  is  thoroughly  in  keeping  with  the  text  or  motto 
of  this  chapter  from  Bacon, who,  in  citingthe  CirenaicssLVLdEpicurceans 
as  to  virtue  and  pleasure,  writes :  ''  And  made  virtue  (as  it  is  used  in 
some  Comedies  of  Erroks),  to  be  but  as  a  servant,  without  which 
pleasure  cannot  be  served  and  attended. "  {Advancement  of  Learn- 
ing, book  V.  p.  74,  1605. ) 

In  yielding  to  Adriana,  Antipholus  of  Syracuse  has  trampled 
virtue,  his  attendant,  under  foot.  Virtue  is  transformed  by  vice 
into  the  likeness  of  an  animal.  It  is  only  by  escaping  and  fleeing 
vice,  virtue  can  find  its  better  self  or  other  half. 

We  may  perceive  in  the  following  extract  from  Plato's  Banquet, 
from  whence,  perhaps,  the  idea  of  the  Comedy  of  Errors  has  been 
borrowed.  In  Socrates'  repetition  of  the  instruction  concerning 
Love,  (he  received  from  Diotima,)  he  says: 

*^  There  is  a  saying,  continued  she,  that  lovers  are  in  search  of 
the  OTHER  HALF  OF  THEMSELVES.  But  my  doctrinc  is,  that  we  love 
neither  the  half  nor  even  the  whole  of  ourselves,  if  it  happen  not, 
my  friend,  to  be  good."    (p.  171,  The  Banquet,  Sydenham.) 

What  Diotima  means  is  that  we  only  discover  another  self  when 
we  elevate  the  soul  and  separate  it  by  virtuous  living  from  the  body. 

Every  man  is  endowed  with  two  geniuses, — a  good  and  a  bad 
one.  The  former  of  these  two  belongs  to  his  understanding  or 
reason,  as  a  bridle  to  his  passions,  affections  and  appetites,  which 
latter,  when  in  revolt,  constitute  his  evil  genius.  The  good  genius 
belongs  to  the  spirit,  and  to  the  future  welfare  of  an  individual. 
The  bad  genius  arises  from  the  body  as  will,  suggesting  pleasure  in 
the  present.    Bacon  writes:    "  The  will  of  man  and  his  understand- 


122  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

ing  are  twins  at  bieth." — "  Saving  that  this  Janus  is  bifronted, 
and  turns  faces. ''^    (Book  v.  ch.  i.,  De  Augmentis.) 

Now  let  the  reader  note  Autipholus  of  Syracuse  and  Antipholus 
of  Ephesus  are  twins,  and  are  brought  into  direct  rivalry  and  oppo- 
sition by  their  relationship  to  Adriana  (the  wife  of  Antipholus  of 
Ephesus).  They  resemble  each  other  so  closely  that,  though  they 
really  are  separate  individuals,  they  appear  as  identical.  Is  not  this 
the  exact  parallel  of  the  relationship  obtaining  between  the  soul  and 
the  body  of  man  ?  Do  we  not  identify  our  ego  with  our  body,  and 
often  deny  the  soul, — particularly  if  we  exalt  the  passions  and  deny 
the  spirit?  Yet  a  time  and  moments  come  to  all  of  us,  when  we 
apprehend  another  real  self,  apart  and  separate  from  our  bodily  and 
everyday  individualism,  and  which  real  self  is  the  direct  opposite  to 
the  passions,  affections  and  appetites  of  the  will  and  moment.  Let 
the  reader  study  this  passage  from  the  Comedy  of  Errors: 

Adriana.    I  see  two  husbands,  or  mine  eyes  deceive  me. 
Buke.     One  of  these  men  is  genius  to  the  other: 
And  so  of  these.    Which  is  the  natural  man 
And  which  the  spirit  ?    Who  deciphers  them  f 

(Act  V.  4.) 

My  hypothesis  is,  these  twins  represent  the  natural  man  and 
the  SPIRITUAL  MAN,  both  in  one  body,  yet  separate  as  to  logic  and 
ethic.  Suppose  Bacon  thought  fit  to  illustrate,  by  means  of  a 
"  philosophical  play  system,"  the  relationship  of  the  Understanding 
(or  reason)  to  the  Will  (appetites,  affections,  passions)  or  body  ?  He 
has  stated  they  are,  (he  considers,)  twins  by  birth.  That  is,  they  con- 
stitute, like  Hermia  and  Helena  in  the  Dream,  a  dual  unity,  at  once 
separate  as  to  essence,  though  identical  as  to  habitation.  The  good 
and  evil  in  us  are  always  in  rivalry,  opposition  and  at  cross-purposes- 
We  are  often  in  action  with  ourselves,  j  ust  as  Antipholus  of  Syra- 
cuse is  with  Antipholus  of  Ephesus.  The  present  pleasure  supplants 
the  future  good,  and  excludes  the  better  angel.  We  each  possess  a 
character  purely  sensuous  drawing  us  on  to  pleasure.  Wo  possess 
another  arguing  us  away  from  it.  Directly  we  yield  to  vice  or  the 
body,  and  it  fastens  upon  us  as  Adriana  does  on  Antipholus  of 
Syracuse,  in  the  shape  of  vice  (beautfully  represented  by  the  vine), 
our  better  half  or  lawful  husband  (understanding  and  reason  as  the 
spiritual  self)  is  recognized  no  more,  and  is  denied  entrance.  We 
may  see  this,  I  suggest,  pictured  in  the  denial  of  recognition  the 
real  Antipholus  of  Ephesus  receives  at  the  hands  of  his  wife,  who, 
reveling  with  Antipholus,  of  Syracuse,  refuses  to  admit  or  recognize 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  123 

him  as  her  real  and  lawful  master.  The  sophistry  of  the  passions 
and  affections  is  such  that  they  illaqueate  the  understanding,  and, 
when  we  allow  the  bad  genius  to  oust  the  good  one,  we  confound  the 
present  good  of  the  senses  with  the  individuality,  and  we  no  longer 
distinguish  clearly  between  good  and  evil — our  twin  characters! 

The  fact  there  are  twin  servants  introduced  by  the  poet  to  match 
their  twin  masters,  betrays  the  philosophical  intention  of  the  author. 
In  the  play  of  the  Twins  by  Plautus  there  are  no  twin  seconds  or 
servants  of  the  protagonists  of  the  action.  Bacon  alludes  to  the 
dispute  of  the  schools  of  Zeno  and  Socrates,  against  the  schools  of 
the  Cirenaics  and  Epicurseans  as  to  happiness  simple  or  attended. 

Bacon  writes : 

"  As  in  some  Comedies  of  Errors,  where  the  mistress  and  maid 
change  habits. "  The  student  mu^t  perceive  at  once  that  such  like- 
ness as  furnished  by  twins,  amounting  to  mistake  of  identity,  is 
exactly  the  same  thing  as  the  disguise  intended  by  change  of  hab- 
its! The  same  philosophical  purport  is  served  by  this  deceitful 
resemblance. 

Both  the  Antipholi  are  attended  by  themselves,  and  yet  separate 
from  their  real  selves.  Thus  in  life  we  are  always  attended  by  our 
good  and  evil  angels,  by  the  master,  (our  mind  and  understanding) 
—  by  our  bodies,  (our  servants  and  our  pleasures) —  the  will.  If  we 
allow  our  servants  to  master  us,  and  we  give  rein  to  the  "  wild 
horses^^  of  the  body,  we  become  servants  of  the  animal  in  us,  and 
are,  like  Bottom  and  Dromio,  translated  into  their  likenesses  by 
metaphor. 

Cicero  writes :  "  It  has  been  said,  then,  by  the  most  learned  men, 
that  none  but  the  wise  man  is  free.''  {Paradoxes,  part  v.) 

Lord  Bacon  writes  at  the  commencement  of  the  fifth  book  of  his 
JDe  Augmentis:  "  The  purity  of  Illumination  and  the  liberty  of  the 
will  began  together,  fell  together. "  This  is  as  much  as  to  say  that 
in  had  men  the  will  is  not  free,  and  identifies  free  will  with  the  light 
and  strength  of  the  understanding, —  knowledge  and  virtue.  The 
same  doctrine  is  repeated  by  Socrates  in  one  of  Plato's  Dialogues 
entitled  Ttepi  i/^evSoi,  concerning  Error,  and  I  think  the  Comedy  of 
Errors,  is  largely  indebted  for  its  philosophical  purport,  as  intention, 
to  this  idea.    In  this  Dialogue  is  argued 

*'  Whether  error  in  the  will  depends  on  error  in  the  judgment. 
Socrates  takes  the  affirmative  side  of  the  question  ;  and  his  end  is  to 
prove  the  necessity  of  informing  the  understanding  in  moral  truths, 
that  is,  of  acquiring  moral  science  j  together  with  the  necessity  of 


124  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

maintaining  the  governing  part  within  ns  in  full  power  over  that 
which  is  inferior,  that  is,  of  acquiring  habits  of  virtue ;  through 
want  of  such  science  and  of  which  power  or  virtue  man  is  led  blindly 
or  impelled  into  evil.  This  design  is  executed  in  three  parts.  The 
first  is  concerning  words,  the  second  part  is  concerning  actions,  the 
third  proves  that  in  dishonest  or  bad  men  the  understanding  is 
either  unenlightened  and  blinded  by  passion,  or  else  suffers  in  both 
ways,  and  therefore,  that,  with  the  ignorance  or  impotence  of  mind 
under  which  they  labor,  they  labor  at  the  same  tiuje  under  a  neces- 
sity of  doing  ill :  from  which  necessity  they  can  be  freed  only  by 
inward  light  and  strength,  that  is,  by  science  or  virtue.  Here  we 
find  the  Sapiens  sibique  Imperiosus  of  Horace  {Satyr  vii.,  book  ii.) 

''Thy  master  does  himself  some  master  serve, 
Some  impulse  sets  in  action  every  nerve. 
Think  not  the  puppet  in  his  own  command; 
His  strings  are  governed  by  another's  hand. 
Who  then  is  free?    Who,  not  by  passion  fool'd, 
In  every  motion  is  by  reason  ruled. 
To  all  but  reason,  he  superior  still 
Moves,  but  as  bids  him,  his  own  better  will. " 

*'  Agreeable  to  this  is  that  doctrine  of  the  stoic  derived  immedi- 
ately, it  would  seem,  from  this  dialogue  of  Plato,  'that  only  the  wise 
man  is  free,'  upon  which  maxim  the  fifth  satyr  of  Persius  is  a  lively 
comment.  But  this  being  a  philosophical  parodox,  Plato  employs 
great  address  in  insinuating  into  the  mind  a  truth,  which  our  own 
consciousness  seems  to  contradict;  for  who  is  there,  not  under  out- 
ward restraint,  and  only  influenced  by  inward  motives,  who  does 
not  think  himself  free?  Our  subtle  philosopher,  therefore,  argues 
upon  the  supposition  of  the  freedom  of  will  in  bad  men,  and  by  thus 
arguing  proves  an  absurdity,  '  that  such  as  do  evil  wilfully  arc  better 
men  than  those  who  do  evil  without  intending  it.^  The  consequence 
of  which  is  this:  that  the  argument  proceeded  upon  a  false  suppo- 
sition; for  that  none  do  evil  with  a  clearsighted  and  distinct  view, 
and  that  in  bad  men  the  will  is  not  free. ''  {Sydenham's  Plato,  vol.  i.. 
Argument  of  Lesser  Hippias.) 

The  reader  will  perceive,  how  very  closely  the  play  of  the  Comedy 
of  Errors,  approximates  in  the  main  action,  the  thesis  embraced  in 
this  dialogue  of  Plato's  entitled  the  Lesser  Hippias,  by  Sydenham. 
The  latter  sums  up  the  argument  of  the  dialogue  in  the  words  already 
quoted:  "  Whether  error  in  the  will  depends  on  error  in  the  judgment. " 
Now,  please  mark,  Adriana  is  plainly  connoted  with  revolt  ofivill.  In 
reply  to  her  sister's  remark  that "  The  husband  is  bridle  of  the  will, " 
she  replies,  "  None  but  asses  will  be  bridled  so."  And  it  is  a  very 
remarkable  thing,  we  find  Dromio,  the  servant  of  Antipholus  of 
Syracuse,  directly  Adriana  fastens  on  his  master,  declaring  he  is 
ridden   and  transformed  into  an  ass.     I  maintain  the  vine  is  a 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  125 

metaphor  for  the  revolted  will,  as  passions,  appetites,  in  opposition 
to  the  understanding,  typified  by  her  sister  Luciana,  who  preaches 
self  government.  It  may  be  seen  Adriana  mistakes  Antipholus  of 
Syracuse  in  this  scene  for  her  husband,  which  exactly  parallels  our 
text  from  Plato :  ''  Error  in  the  will  depends  on  error  in  the 
judgment."  Antipholus  of  Syracuse,  we  maintain,  is  seeking  him- 
self—  that  is  his  better  genius  or  good  angel  typified  by  his  twin 
brother, —  whom  he  can  only  find  by  submission  of  his  will  to  his 
understanding,  that  is,  by  virtue.  Adriana  is  therefore  introduced 
representatively  to  show  the  result  of  "  Error  in  the  will, "  when 
influenced  by  passion,  and  independent  of  judgment  or  understand- 
ing. The  working  on  the  master  (or  mind)  is  shown  by  the  working 
on  the  servant  or  body.  Directly  the  evil  angel  steps  in,  the  good 
angel  is  known  no  more,  and  is  confounded  or  unrecognized.  That  is, 
the  illumination  of  the  soul,  by  which  we  recognize  another  self, 
depends  upon  purity  and  virtue.  The  intention  of  the  play  seems 
to  me  to  prove  the  existence  of  another  self  as  soul,  and  to  show  it  is 
not  to  be  discovered,  whilst  we  remain  slaves  or  servants  of  the  body 
and  its  passions. 

We  stand  between  ourselves  and  our  better  selves,  and  are 
claimed  by  our  worse  selves. 

Our  passions,  vices  and  pleasures  of  the  moment  say,  this  is  the 
man,  pointing  to  the  glass  of  our  individuality.  The  judgment  and 
reason,  (when  purified,)  say,  no,  the  real  man  is  within,  and  in  the 
directest  contrast  with  appearance  and  the  actor. 

Adriana  is  just  such  a  worse  self  as  vice,  laying  claim  to  Antiph- 
olus of  Syracuse,  and  refusing  to  recognize  the  spiritual  man, 
who,  by  this  very  act,  is  kept  out.  It  is  only  those  who  have 
wrestled  with  the  flesh  and  clearly  recognized  the  two  souls,  which,  as 
Goethe  says  in  Faust,  "  exist  in  every  breast, "  who  will  understand 
the  theory  of  the  play,  I  propound.  It  is,  in  fact,  a  history  and 
personification  of  the  spirit  and  soul — twin  brothers  to  the  body, 
born  at  the  same  moment  and  lost,  until,  by  virtuous  living,  we 
become  as  little  children  and  are  born  again. 

Those  who  question  the  ethical  purpose  of  the  play,  may  receive 
a  hint  from  the  third  scene  of  the  fourth  act,  where  Adriana  (as 
vice  I  maintain)  is  introduced  with  a  courtesan. 

Enter  a  Courtesan. 
Cour.  Well  met,  well  met,  Master  Antipholus. 
I  see,  sir,  you  have  found  the  goldsmith  now ; 
Is  that  the  chain  you  promised  me  to-day  ? 


126  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

Ant.  S.  Satan,  avoid!  I  charge  thee,  tempt  me  not. 

Dro.  S.  Master,  is  this  Mistress  Satan? 

Ant.  S.  It  is  the  devil. 

Dro.  S.  Nay,  she  is  worse,  she  is  the  devil's  dam,  and  here  she 
comes  in  the  habit  of  a  light  wench,  and  thereof  comes  that  the 
wenches  say  "  God  damn  me;  "  that's  as  much  to  say  "  God  make 
me  a  light  wench."  It  is  written,  they  appear  to  men  like  angels  of 
light;  light  is  an  effect  of  fire,  and  fire  will  burn ;  ergo,  light  wenches 
will  burn.     Come  not  near  her. 

Cour.  Your  man  and  you  are  marvelous  merry,  sir. 
Will  you  go  with  me?    We'll  mend  our  dinner  here? 

Dro.  S.  Master,  if  you  do,  expect  spoon-meat,  or  bespeak  a  long 
spoon. 

Ant.  S.  Why,  Dromio? 

Dro.  S.  Marry,  he  must  have  a  long  spoon  that  must  eat  with 
the  devil. 

Ant.  S.  Avoid  then,  fiend!  what  tell'st  thou  me  of  supping  ? 
Thou  art,  as  you  are  all,  a  sorceress; 
I  conjure  thee  to  leave  me  and  be  gone. 

Adriana  is  most  probably  copied  from  Erotium  in  the  Menaechini 
of  Plautus,  who  is  represented  as  a  courtesan,  and  whose  Greek 
name  speaks  for  itself,  in  its  (erotic)  root,  meaning,  as  love  or  passion. 
It  may  be  again  noticed  Dromio  of  Syracuse,  in  the  above  passage, 
is  the  good  character  who  is  continually  cautioning  his  master,  like 
some  virtuous  conscience,  to  avoid  evil  and  eschew  temptation. 

Bacon  writes : 

"  The  first  means  of  escaping  is  to  resist  the  earliest  temptation 
in  the  beginning,  and  dihgeutly  avoid  and  cut  off  all  occasions  that 
may  solicit  or  sway  the  mind;  and  this  is  well  represented  bt/  shut- 
ting up  the  ears,  a  kind  of  remedy  to  be  necessarily  used  with  mean 
and  vulgar  minds,  such  as  the  retinue  of  Ulysses. " 

{The  Sirens  or  Pleasures,  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients.) 

The  student  will  observe  Antipholus  of  Syracuse  and  his  servant 
Dromio  escape  by  flight  from  the  temptation  of  Adriana  and  her 
siren  witchery,  on  board  their  ship.  Thus  by  leading  a  virtuous 
life,  and  shutting  up  their  ears,  they  discover  and  arrive  at  their 
true  selves,  their  twin  brothers  in  the  end.  My  theory  is,  the  Antipholi 
are  really  two  personified  aspects  of  one  man,  the  false  man  and  the 
real  man,  and  these  two  revolve  upon  virtue  and  vice  or  character. 
Throughout  Bacon's  writings  there  is  a  strong  distinction  drawn 
between  the  real  man,  and  the  outward  man,  or  actor.  He  writes 
with  profound  irony  and  truth.  "  He  that  is  only  real  had  need 
have  exceeding  great  parts  of  virtue,  as  the  stone  had  need  to  be  rich 
that  is  set  without  foil."    {Of  Ceremonies  and  Respects,  Essay  52). 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  127 

In  his  Essay  on  Truth,  he  writes  : 

"  Doth  any  man  doubt,  that  if  there  were  taken  out  of  men's 
minds  vain  opinions,  flattering  hopes,  false  valuations,  imaginati6ns 
as  one  would,  and  the  like,  but  it  would  leave  the  minds  of  a  number 
of  men  poor  shrunken  things,  full  of  melancholy  and  Indisposition, 
and  unpleasing  to  themselves?  One  of  the  fathers,  in  great  severity, 
called  poesy  "  vinum  dsemonum,"  because  it  fiUeth  the  imagination, 
and  yet  it  is  but  with  the  shadow  of  a  lie." 

Oliver  Wendel  Holmes  has  wittily  observed,  that  every  man  has 
three  distinct  selves, —  ''what  he  imagines  himself  to  be,  what 
others  think  he  is,  what  God  knows  him  to  be." 

Bacon  writes : 

"  A  mixture  of  a  lie  doth  ever  add  pleasure.  This  same  truth  is 
a  naked  and  open  daylight,  that  doth  not  show  the  masks  and  mum- 
meries and  triumphs  of  the  world  half  so  stately  and  daintily  as 
candle-lights  "  {of  truth). 

Bacon  is  here  clearly  identifying  the  World  with  plays,  and  with 
the  aetor^s  art. 

Or  study  this,  from  the  Conference  of  Pleasure,  written  about  the 
same  time  the  Comedy  of  Errors  was  being  acted  for  the  first  time 
at  Gray's  Inn : 

"  My  praise  shall  be  dedicated  to  the  mind  itself.  The  mind  is 
the  man,  and  the  knowledge  of  the  mind.  A  man  is  but  what  he 
knoweth.  The  mind  itself  is  but  an  accident  to  knowledge,  for 
knowledge  is  a  double  of  that  which  is. "    {Bacon^s  Works,  ii.  123.) 

Our  true  self  is  a  thing  constantly  denied  recognition,  and 
against  which  we  ourselves  conspire,  in  proportion  as  we  allow  the 
unpruned  vines  of  vice  to  luxuriate,  and  envelop  our  souls  in  the 
Dionysiac  excitements  of  life,  be  it  passion  or  wine,  folly  or  temp- 
tation. The  mind  and  the  body  are  two  distinct  twin  characters 
in  conflict  and  at  cross-purposes  with  each  other,  and  out  of  this 
dualism  all  error  arises.  To  find  our  true  selves,  or  the  regenera- 
tion by  restraint  is  the  aim  of  a  perfect  life.  Bacon's  doctrine  of  the 
will  and  the  understanding,  which  he  says  "  turn  faces  and  are  Janus 
like, "  is  simply  body  and  intellect,  in  other  words,  the  great  dualism 
of  matter  and  mind. 

Kobert  Fludd,  the  great  Enghsh  Rosicrucian,  writes : 

"  Concludimus  igitur  quod  lesus  sit  templi  humani  lapis  angularis, 
atque  ita,  ex  mortuis  lapides  vivi  facti  sunt  homines  pii,  idque  trans- 
mutatione  reali  ab  Adami  lapi  statu  in  statum  sua  innocentiae  et  per- 
fectionis,  i.  e.,  a  vili  et  leprosa  plumbi  conditione  in  auri  pursissimi 
perfectionem. "    {Summum  Bonum,  1  29,  p.  37.) 


128  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

This  is  the  parable  of  the  Caskets,  in  the  Merchant  of  Venice,  over 
again.  That  is,  the  real  gold  is  within,  and  not  external.  The  king- 
dom of  heaven  is  within  us,  not  outside.  This  is  the  regeneration  of 
the  Spiritual  Man !  It  is  just  what  the  parable  of  the  Caskets 
enforces, —  the  invisible  and  internal  against  the  visible  and  the 
external.  This  is  the  Restoration  (or  part  of  it)  Bacon  and  the  Rosi- 
crucians  endlessly  propose, —  that  is,  that  man  should  again  return 
to  his  condition  before  the  Fall,  and  live  upright, —  that  is,  with 
his  entire  body  in  subjection  to  his  intellect  and  heart. 

The  reader  may  perceive,  that  the  parable  of  the  Caskets  in  the 
Merchant  of  Venice  is  purely  Alchymical  or  Bosicrucian.  Bassanio 
discovers  Portia's  portrait  (and  so  wins  her),  in  the  despised  lead 
CASKET  which  contains  the  real  gold  so  to  speak.  General  Hitch- 
cock has  ably  pointed  out  in  his  works  {Alchymy,  Bemarks  on, 
Shakespeare^ s  sonnets,  etc.,)  that  the  expression  ^' transmutation  of 
metals  "  (particularly  lead,  into  gold),  was  a  mere  figure  of  speech 
with  the  Hermetists  and  Alchymists,  to  signify  regeneration  through 
the  spirit. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Midsummer  Night's  Dream  and  Bacon's  Thirteenth  Defi- 
cient OF  A  New  World  of  Sciences,  or  Magia  Natur- 

ALIS. 

Arcana  publicata  vilescunt,  et  gratiam  prophanata  amittunt. 
Ergo:  no  Margaritas  objice  porcis,  seu  Asmo  substernerc  rosas. 

[Chymical  Marriage  of  Christian  Rosy  cross,  1459.) 

Oberon  first  appears  in  the  old  French  romance  of  Huon  de 
Bourdeaux,  and  is  identical  with  Elberich,  the  dwarf  king  of  the 
German  story  of  Otriet  in  the  Heldenbuch.  The  name  Elberich,  or, 
as  it  appears  in  the  Nibelungenlied,  Albrich,  was  changed,  in  pass- 
ing into  French,  first  into  Auberich,  then  into  Auberon,  and  finally 
became  our  Oberon.  Now,  it  is  very  striking  to  find  Bacou,  under 
the  thirteenth  of  his  Deficients  of  a  New  World  of  Sciences,  entitled 
Magia  Naturalis,  or  Natural  Magic,  writing : 

"  As  for  the  natural  magic  (which  flies  abroad  in  many  men's 
books),  containing  certain  credulous  and  superstitious  traditions  and 
observations  of  sympathies  and  antipathies,  and  of  hidden  and 
specific  properties,  with  some  experiments  commonly  frivolous, 
strange  rather  for  the  art  of  conveyance  and  disguisement  than  the 
thing  itself,  surely  he  shall  not  much  err,  who  shall  say  that  this  sort 
of  magic,  is  as  far  differing  from  such  a  knowledge  as  we  require  as 
the  books  of  the  gests  of  Arthur  of  Britain,  or  of  Hugh  of  Bordeaux 
differs  from  Ccesar^s  Commentaries  in  truth  of  story."  (p.  169,  Ad- 
vancement of  Learning,  1640. 

This  is  the  more  striking,  inasmuch  as  Oberon  and  Titania 
evidently  are  intended,  in  the  play  of  the  Midsummer  Nighfs  Bream, 
to  depict  the  magical,  invisible  and  occult  powers  of  nature,  over- 
riding the  entire  mechanism  or  action  of  the  play.  That  these  two 
are  personifications  of  the  higher  powers  of  nature  cannot  be  ques- 
tioned by  a  close  observer  of  the  text.  It  is  owing  to  their  quarrels 
^^  the  seasons  alter, ^'  and  they  term  themselves  the  '^parents  and 
origlnaW^  of  the  elements. 

129 


130  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

An  important  proof  of  the  intention  of  the  poet's  mind  with 
regard  to  Titania,  is  made  manifest  in  the  choice  of  her  name. 

*'  The  name  Titania  for  the  queen  of  the  fairies  appears  to  have 
been  the  invention  of  Shakespeare,  for,  as  Mr.  Ritson  remarks,  she 
is  not  'so  called  by  any  other  writer.'  Why,  however,  the  poet 
designated  her  by  this  title,  presents,  according  to  Mr.  Keightly,  no 
difficulty.  'It  was,'  he  says,  'the  belief  of  those  days  that  the 
fairies  were  the  same  as  the  classic  nymphs,  the  attendants  of  Diana. 
The  fciiry  queen  was  therefore  the  same  as  Diana,  whom  Ovid  (Met. 
iii.  173)  styles  Titania. " 

In  Chaucer's  Merchants  Tale  Pluto  is  the  King  of  Faerie,  and 
his  queen  Proserpina."  (Folk-Lore  of  Shakespeare.  Thiselton- 
Dyer,  p.  4. ) 

This  theory  of  the  identity  of  the  fairy  element  with  the  classic 
nymphs,  is  borne  out  by  the  classic  names  prominent  in  the  play,— 
Theseus,  Hyppolita,  Egeus,  Demetrius,  Lysander,  Helena  and 
Hermia,  even  to  the  site  or  locahty  chosen — Athens !  It  is  my  con- 
viction the  fairy  element  has  been  conceived,  as  the  magic  or  spiritual 
in  nature,  which  gives  to  the  world  its  character  of  all  encircling 
wonder,  and  which  plays  fantastic  tricks  with  our  reasoning  faculties, 
deceiving  us  by  its  invisibility  and  mystery,  setting  us  at  cross- 
purposes  with  ourselves  and  the  objective  world, —  in  short,  the 
contradictions  existing  between  the  senses  and  the  intellect,  matter 
and  mind. 

It  is  excessively  curious  to  refind  the  Rosicrucians  repeating  all 
this  exactly.  One  of  the  most  illustrious  of  the  Rosicrucian  Frater- 
nity was  Joseph  Francis  Borri,  who  appeared  shortly  after  the 
death  of  John  Heydon.  His  work  La  Chiave  del  Gahinetto  contains 
their  chief  tenets.  This  book  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Abbe  Vil- 
lars,  who  founded  upon  it  his  cabalistic  romance,  The  Count  de 
Gabalis  : 

"  In  the  second  conversation  between  the  Count  de  Gabalis  and 
his  interlocutor,  the  former  says,  '  When  you  are  enrolled  among 
the  number  of  the  children  of  philosophy,  and  when  your  eyes  are 
strengthened  by  the  use  of  our  most  holy  medicine,  you  will  see  that 
all  the  elements  are  inhabited  by  a  race  of  perfect  creatures,  which 
are  concealed  from  the  general  eye  of  humanity  in  consequence  of 
the  sin  of  Adam.  That  immense  space  which  lies  between  the  earth 
and  heaven  has  inhabitants  far  more  noble  than  the  birds  and  flies. 
The  vast  seas  have  other  dwellers  than  whales  and  dolphins;  the 
depths  of  the  earth  are  not  for  the  moles  alone ;  and  the  element  of 
fire,  nobler  by  far  than  the  other  three,  was  not  made  to  remain  void 
and  uninhabited. 

"  '  The  air  is  filled  with  an  innumerable  multitude  of  beings  in 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  131 

human  shape, —  proud  and  majestic  in  their  appearance,  but  very 
mild  in  reality.  They  are  great  lovers  of  science,  subtle,  fond  of 
rendering  service  to  the  wise,  but  great  enemies  of  the  foolish  and 
the  ignorant.  .  .  .  The  seas  and  the  rivers  are  inhabited  in  like 
manner.  The  ancient  sages  named  these  people  the  Undines  or  the 
Nymphs.  The  males  are  few  among  them,  but  the  females  are  in 
great  number.  Their  beauty  is  extreme,  and  the  daughters  of  man 
cannot  be  compared  to  them.  The  earth  is  filled  almost  to  the  cen- 
ter with  Gnomes  —  people  smaller  in  stature,  who  guard  the  treas- 
ures of  the  mines,  and  keep  watch  over  precious  stones.  These  are 
very  ingenious,  very  friendly  to  man,  and  easy  to  command.  They  fur- 
nish the  children  of  philosophy  (the  Rosicrucians)  with  all  the  money 
they  require,  and  think  themselves  sufficiently  rewarded  by  our 
friendship.  The  Gnomides,  their  females,  are  small,  but  very  beau- 
tiful and  agreeable,  and  their  dress  is  very  curious.  As  regards  the 
Salamanders,  inhabitants  of  the  fire,  they  also  render  service  to  the 
children  of  philosophy,  but  do  not  seek  their  company  so  eagerly  as 
the  others;  and  their  wives  and  daughters  are  very  rarely  seen  by 
mortal  eyes They  are  by  far  the  most  beautiful  of  the  ele- 
mentary spirits,  being  compounded  of  the  most  subtile  and  beauti- 
ful of  all  the  elements.  By  becoming  a  member  of  our  fraternity, 
you  will  be  enabled  to  see  and  converse  with  all  these  glorious  mul- 
titudes; you  will  see  their  mode  of  life,  their  manners,  and  make 
acquaintance  with  all  their  admirable  laws.  You  will  be  charmed 
by  the  graces  of  their  mind,  much  more  than  with  the  beauty  of 
their  body ;  but  you  will  not  be  able  to  refrain  from  sorrow  and  pity 
for  their  miserable  fate,  when  you  learn  that  their  soul  is  mortal, 
and  that  they  have  no  hope  of  eternal  felicity  in  the  presence  of  that 
Supreme  Being  whom  they  know,  and  whom  they  religiously  adore. 
They  will  tell  you  that,  being  composed  of  the  purest  particles  of 
the  element  they  inhabit,  and  having  within  them  no  opposite  and 
antagonist  qualities,  being  made  but  of  one  element,  they  live  for 
thousands  of  years.  But  what  is  time,  however  great,  to  eternity? 
They  must  return  into  nothingness  at  last ;  and  this  thought  embit- 
ters their  existence,  and  we  have  great  difficulty  in  consoling  them. 
Our  fathers,  the  philosophers  (the  founders  of  the  Rosi crucian  doc- 
trine), speaking  to  God  in  their  prayers,  remembered  the  sorrow  of 
the  elemental  people,  and  interceded  for  them;  and  God,  whose 
mercy  is  without  limits,  revealed  to  them  that  the  evil  is  not  without 
a  remedy.  He  inspired  them  with  the  knowledge  that,  as  man,  by 
the  alliance  of  holiness  which  he  contracts  with  his  Maker,  may  be 
made  a  participator  in  the  divinity,  so  may  the  Sylphs,  the  Gnomes, 
the  Nymphs  and  the  Salamanders,  by  contracting  an  alliance  with 
man,  be  made  participators  in  man's  immortality.  Thus,  a  Nymph 
or  a  Sylphide  becomes  immortal,  and  has  a  soul  like  man,  if  she  can 
inspire  one  of  us  with  love  toward  her ;  thus  a  Sylph  or  a  Gnome 
ceases  to  be  mortal,  if  one  of  the  daughters  of  man  will  consent  to 
marry  him.  ^  And  oh,  my  son,'  continued  the  Count  de  Gabalis, 
'admire  the  felicity  of  the  Rosicrucians!  Instead  of  women,  whose 
charms  wither  in  a  few  short  years,  and  are  followed  by  ghastly 
wrinkles,  we  ally  ourselves  with  beauties  whose  charms  never  fade 


132  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE, 

away,  and  whom  we  have  the  glory  and  liappiness  of  rendering 
immortal.'  " 

In  reality,  the  Eosicrucians  were  philosophers  who  recognized  the 
vast  priority  and  predominance  'of  the  invisible  and  spiritual  in 
nature  over  the  visible  and  merely  sensuous.  Bacon  is  to  be  refound 
in  his  Natural  History  enforcing  everywhere  this  same  doctrine  of 
Spirit,  which  he  calls  Proserpine.  It  is,  in  short,  the  intellectual 
in  nature  undiscovered  by  us,  and  wedded  to  cause  and  effect,  as 
mechanical  history  which  overrides  and  governs  the  destiny  of  man. 
Edison's  phonograph  to  a  savage  would  appear  magical;  Bacon, 
therefore,  has  purged  the  word  "  magic"  as  a  word  used  improperly, 
and  belonging  to  those  things  in  nature  not  understood,  or  dimly 
apprehended  as  yet.    Godwin  writes  of  the  Kosicrucian  Fairies: 

"  To  be  admitted  to  their  acquaintance,  it  was  necessary  that  the 
organs  of  human  sight  should  he  purged. "  {Lives  of  the  Necroman- 
cers, "  p.  36,  Wm.  Godwin,  1834.) 

It  is  very  remarkable  to  find  Titania  in  the  dream  addressing 
this  doctrine  to  Bottom  : 

And  I  will  purge  thy  mortal  grossness  so 
That  thou  shalt  like  an  airy  spirit  go. 

(Act  iii.  sc.  1.) 

One  of  Bacon's  ideas  is,  that  everything  sensible  that  we  are 
acquainted  with,  contains  an  invisible  and  intangible  spirit,  which 
it  works  and  clothes  as  with  a  garment  (vol.  iv.,  p.  195;  vol.  v.,  p. 
224).  This  seems  to  be  very  near  to  the  idea  expressed  in  Goethe's 
Faust  by  the  Erd-Geist. 

The  alchymist  Paracelsus  asserts  that  the  elements  were  peopled - 
with  life, — the  air  with  Sylphs  and  Sylvains,  the  water  with  Undines, 
the  earth  with  Gnomes,  and  the  fire  with  Salamanders. 

Paracelsus  indeed  was  one  of  the  great  authorities  of  the  Eosi- 
crucians, and  it  is  excessively  strange  to  find  amongst  some  "  Char- 
acters of  the  Lord  Bacon, "  there  is  one  given  by  Dr.  Peter  Heylin 
(In  his  Life  of  Archbishop  Laud,  Part  i,  page  64,  1620,  which  may 
be  found  in  Baconiana,  or  Certain  Genuine  Bemains  of  Sir  Francis 
Bacon,  1679),  as  follows: 

'^  The  Lord  Chancellor  Bacon  was  a  man  of  a  most  strong  brain 
and  a  Chymical  Head  ;  designing  his  endeavors  to  the  perfecting  of 
the  Works  of  Nature;  or,  rather,  improving  nature  to  the  best 
advantages  of  life,  and  the  common  benefit  of  mankind.  Pity  it 
was,  he  was  not  entertained  with  some  liberal  salary,  which,  had  it 
been,  he  might  have  given  us  such  a  body  of  natural  philosophy, 
and  made  it  so  subservient  to  the  public  good,  that  neither  Aristotle 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  133 

or  Theophrastus  amongst  the  ancients ;  nor  Paracelsus,  or  the  rest 
6f  our  later  Chymists,  would  have  been  considerable," 

The  student  will  observe  the  incomprehensible  allusion  to 
Theophrastus,  who  described  Characters,  and  also  the  allusion  to 
Paracelsus. 

In  the  third  book  of  TJie  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640,  page 
169,  Bacon,  under  the  head  of  the  deficient  "  Magia  Naturalis, 
or  the  setting  of  Forms  on  Work  "  (Cap.  v.  s.  i  ^  i.  13th  Deficient), 
discusses  just  the  sort  of  natural  magic  which  we  refind  hinted  at 
in  the  persons  of  Oberon,  Titania  and  Puck.  Indeed,  it  is  not  going 
too  far  to  declare  there  is  little  doubt,  if  carefully  considered,  he  is 
writing  with  a  direct  eye  upon  The  Midsummer  NigMs  Dream,  for 
he  immediately  mentions  the  sources  of  the  fairy  mythology  of  the 
Dream,  in  the  passage  already  cited. 

Bacon  continues  :  *'  Of  this  kind  of  learning,  the  fable  of  Ixion 
was  a  figure ;  who,  projecting  with  himself  to  enjoy  Juno,  the  God- 
dess of  Power,  had  copulation  with  a  cloud,  of  which  he  begot  Cen- 
taurs and  Chimeras.  So,  whoever  are  carried  away  with  a  frantic 
and  impotent  passion,  and  vaporous  conceit  to  those  things  which 
only,  through  the  fumes  and  clouds  of  imagination  they  fancy  to 
themselves  to  see,  instead  of  substantial  operations,  they  are  deliv- 
ered of  nothing  but  airy  hopes  (spes  inanes),  and  certain  deformed 
and  monstrous  apparitions.  The  operation  and  effect  of  this  super- 
ficiary and  degenerous  Natural  Magic  upon  men,  is  like  some 
soporiferous  drugs,  which  procure  Sleep,  and  withal  exhale  into 
the  fancy,  merry  and  pleasant  Dreams  in  Sleep.  (P.  169,  Lib.  iii., 
Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 

Now,  this  passage,  profoundly  studied,  approximates  very  closely 
to  the  character  of  Bottom,  and  his  transformation  as  a  deformed 
monster.  He  is  stirred  by  a  vaporous  conceit,  and  impotent  passion, 
to  play  before  the  Duke,  and  he  finally  falls  asleep  under  the 
influence  of  Titania,  or  Nature,  overcome  by  the  encircling  power  of 
her  arms  as  by  ivy.  This  plant  is  well  known  to  possess  a  soporific 
power,  taken  as  a  drug.  The  whole  of  Bottom's  transformation  is 
figured  as  a  dream  he  has  undergone  in  sleep. 

The  female  ivy  so 
Enrings  the  barky  fingers  of  the  elm. 

(Act  iv.  1.) 

Bottom's  transformation  is  not  a  reality,  but  only  a  dream,  in 
which  he  sees  himself  as  he  really  is,  or  has  been.    Besides  just  what 


134  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

Bacon  terms  "  a  deformed  and  monstrous  apparition, ''  is  presented 
by  Bottom's  translation. 

Quince.    0  monstrous  !  O  strange  !    We  are  haunted. 

(Act  iii.  1.) 

Bottom  Wakes. 
*'  Bottom.  I  have  had  a  most  rare  vision.  I  had  a  dream,  past  the 
wit  of  man  to  say  what  dream  it  was.  Man  is  but  an  ass  if  he  go 
about  to  expound  this  dream.  Methought  I  was,  and  methought  I 
had.  But  man  is  but  a  patched  fool,  if  he  will  oifer  to  say,  what 
methought  I  had.  The  eye  of  man  hath  not  heard,  the  ear  of  man 
hath  not  seen,  man's  hand  is  not  able  to  taste,  his  tongue  to  con- 
ceive, or  his  heart  to  report,  what  my  dream  was.  I  will  get  Peter 
Quince  to  write  a  ballet  of  this  dream ;  it  shall  be  called  Bottom's 
Bream,  because  it  hath  no  bottom ;  and  I  will  sing  it  in  the  latter 
end  of  a  play,  before  the  Duke.  Perad venture,  to  make  it  the  more 
gracious,  I  shall  sing  it  at  her  death."    (Act  iv.) 

Now,  I  believe  this  vision  of  Bottom's  is  closely  connected  with 
Virgil's  Elm  of  Vain  Dreams  (282-274  JEneid  vi. ) .  Please  note  in 
the  passage  cited  from  Bacon,  he  introduces  the  Centaurs  and  Chim- 
ceras,  both  of  which  Virgil  introduces  in  context  with  the  elm  or  tree' 
of  airy  hopes. 

On  the  Golden  Ass  (written  by  Apuleius),  Warburton  writes : 

"  The  priest  or  Hierophant  of  the  rites  leads  up  the  train  of  the 
initiated  with  a  garland  of  roses  in  his  hand.  Lucius  ap- 
proaches, DEVOURS  THE  ROSES,  and,  according  to  the  promise  of  the 
goddess,  is  restored  to  his  native  form,  by  which,  as  we  have  said,  no 
more  was  meant  than  a  change  of  manners  from  vice  to  virtue. 
For  an  ass  was  so  far  from  being  detestable  that  it  was  employed  in 
the  celebration  of  her  rites,  and  was  ever  found  in  the  retinue  of  Osiris 
or  Bacchus.  The  garland  plainly  represents  that  which  the  aspirants 
were  crowned  with  at  their  initiation,  as  the  virtue  of  the  roses 
designs  the  mysteries.  At  his  transformation  he  had  been  told  that 
ROSES  were  to  restore  him  to  humanity,  so  that  amid  all  his  adven- 
tures he  had  still  this  remedy  in  view."  (p.  319,  vol.  i.,  Divine 
Legation.) 

Now,  please  note  this  parallel,— Titania  places  musk  roses  on 
Bottom^ s  head,  evidently  a  garland. 
Puck  describes  this  act: 

"  For  she  his  hairy  temples  then  had  rounded 
With  coronet  of  fresh  and  fragrant  flowers.^^ 

(Act.  iv,  1.) 

It  is  plain,  Bottom  is  being  initiated,  and  Titania,  probably  the 
same  Nature  goddess  as  Isis,  Diana,  Luna  (invoked  by  Apuleius). 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  ^  135 

Not  only  this,  Bottom's  sleep  is  really  the  symbolical  death  of  the 
mysteries : 

Ohe.    Silence  awhile.    Robin  take  off  this  head. 
Titaniaj  music  call;  and  strike  more  dead 
Than  common  sleep  of  all  these  Jive  the  sense.     {lb.) 

The  initiation  was  to  refine  and  purify  the  senses  from  the  animal 
passions  and  ass-like  stupidity  afthe  initiate. 

The  reader  may  perceive  that  Bottom's  restoration  to  his  own 
shape  again,  like  that  of  Apuleius,  is  closely  connected  with  the 
roses  placed  on  his  head !  For  within  the  same  scene,  and  indeed 
within  a  few  lines  of  each  other,  this  is  effected. 

I  am  convinced  the  whole  of  the  interlude  is  not  only  a  reflec- 
tion of  the  play  itself,  but  closely  connected  with  the  Bacchic  Mys- 
teries.   For  example,  the  Lion  was  a  symbol  of  Bacchus. 

"  Thus  the  Chorus  of  Bakchai  call  upon  Dionysus  to  put  forth 
his  dreadful  might,  and  to  appear  as  a  flaming  lion  with  radiant 
mane  (Euripides  Bakchai,  1018).  Dionysus,  as  Peter  Bromius  the 
ROARER,  sometimes  appears  as  Leonto  Kephilik  on  Mithraic  and 
Gnostic  symbols."  (Vide  King  the  Gnostics,  54,  101.)  {Great 
IHonyiak  Myth.    Brown,  vol.  ii.,  pp.  61,  62.) 

Compare  : 

Snug.  Have  you  the  Lion's  part  written?  Pray  you  if  it  be, 
give  it  me,  for  I  am  slow  of  study. 

Quince.  You  may  do  it  extempore,  for  it  is  nothing  but  roar- 
ing. 

Bottom.  Let  me  play  the  Lion,  too.  I  will  roar,  that  I  will  do 
any  man's  heart  good  to  hear  me.  I  will  roar,  that  I  will  make  the 
Duke  say.  Let  him  roar  again,  let  him  roar  again.     (Act  i.) 

Next,  the  Apples  of  Dionysus  were  called  Quinces.  "  A  quince 
was  given  in  token  of  fruitfulness  to  the  brides  of  Alliens  upon  the 
day  of  their  marriage."  {Theocritus,  ii.  120;  iii.  10.  Peacham- 
Potter's  Antiquities  of  Greece,  i.  202. )  Now,  one  of  the  characters  in 
this  interlude  is  named  Peter  Quince,  and  they  are  all  rude  mechan- 
icals of  Athens,  which  locality  is  a  powerful  hint  for  the  mysteries 
we  are  alluding  to, —  the  Anthesteria  or  Feast  of  Flowers,  yearly 
celebrated  in  the  month  Anthestrion  (February-March).  This  is 
evidently  repeated  in  Perdita's  flower-gathering  scene  in  the 
Winter^ s  Tale. 

Thucydides  calls  the  Anthesteria,  the  more  ancient  festival  of 
Dionysus  (ii.  15),  and  it  is  closely  connected  with  Theseus  and  held  at 
Athens!    In  these  festivals  Dionysus  was  lampter,  or  the  lamp  or 


136  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUEE. 

lantern,  which  recalls  the  lantern  in  the  interlude.  Besides  comedy 
and  tragedy  were  thus  represented  at  Athens,  for  the  stage  was 
religion  and  philosophy  at  once. 

Thomas  Taylor,  quoting  Empedocles,  and  discussing  that  pass- 
age in  Virgil,  touching  the  Vestibule  of  Hell,  (in  the  vi.  Book 
^neid,)  writes : 

''  This  division  is  threefold;  representing,  in  the  first  place,  the 
external  evil  with  which  this  material  region  is  replete ;  in  the  sec- 
ond place,  intimating  that  the  life  of  the  soul  when  merged  in  the 
body  is  nothing  but  a  dream ;  and,  in  the  third  place,  under  the 
disguise  of  multiform  and  terrific  monsters,  exhibiting  the  various 
vices  of  our  irrational  and  sensuous  part."  (P.  17,  Bacchic  Mys- 
teries.) 

This  is  exactly  what  I  take  to  bo  portrayed  by  Bottom's  transfor- 
mation into  a  monster,  or  rwls,  which  animal  represents  just  this 
sensuous,  irrational,  sluggish  or  stupid  part  of  our  animal  nature. 
It  is  striking  Taylor  makes  these  observations  in  context  with  the 
*'  Tree  of  Dreams  ''  of  Virgil,  viz.:  The  Elm.  I  think,  therefore, 
the  student  will  perceive  that  there  is  a  palpable  connotation  between 
Bottom's  dream  and  Virgil's  Tree  of  Dreams,  the  Elm. 

In  Dante's  Purgatorio  (Canto  xxvii.)  the  story  of  Pyramus  and 
Thisbe  is  clearly  associated  with  purification  by  fire.  The  Angel 
of  Grod  appears  to  Dante  and  cries,  outside  the  fiame  : 

"  No  one  farther  goes,  souls  sanctified, 
If  first  the  fire  bite  not;  within  it  enter. 
And  be  not  deaf  unto  the  song  beyond. 

Upon  my  clasped  hands  I  straightened  me. 
Scanning  the  fire  — 

"  Now,  look  thou,  son, 
'Twixt  Beatrice  and  thee  there  is  this  wall.  ' 
As  at  the  name  of  Thisbe,  oped  his  lids 
The  dying  Pyramus,  and  gazed  upon  her, 
What  time  the  mulberry  became  vermilion 
Even  thus  my  obduracy  being  softened 
I  turned  to  my  wise  guide. 

Again,  Canto  xxxiii.,  Purgatorio,  we  find  purification  by  water. 

**  And  if  thy  vain  imaginings  had  not  been 
Water  ofElsa  round  about  thy  mind, 
And  Pyramus  to  the  mulberry  their  pleasure 
Thou  by  so  many  circumstances  only 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  137 

The  justice  of  the  interdict  of  God 
Morally  in  the  tree  would  recognize. 


From  the  most  holy  water  I  returned 
Begenerate,  in  the  manner  of  new  trees 
That  are  reneived  with  a  new  foliage, 
Pure  and  disposed  to  mount  unto  the  stars. 

xxxiii.  143-145. 

That  the  Dream  deals  in  creative  principles,  platonically  applied 
cannot  be  doubted. 

Theseus.    What  say  you  Hermia?  be  advised  fair  maid 
To  you  your  father  should  be  as  a  god. 
One  that  composed  your  beauties,  yea  and  one 
To  whom  you  are  hut  as  a  form  in  wax 
By  him  imprinted,  and  within  his  power 
To  leave  the  figure  or  disfigure  it.    (Act  i.) 

This  is  nothing  but  Plato's  eternal  image  to  illustrate  the 
imprinting  of  the  Divine  ideas  upon  creation,  as  a  seal  stamps  its 
image  upon  wax.  That  is,  entire  creation  is  fashioned  according  to 
mind,  and  bears  the  impress,  even  as  the  poet  stamps  ideas  upon  his 
creations.  This  theory  was  revived  by  the  Rosicrucians,  and  par- 
ticularly by  Jacob  Boehmen,  the  seer  of  Grorlitz,  one  of  whose  works 
bears  the  title  Be  Signatura  Berum,  or  The  Signatures  of  Things. 
Lord  Bacon  writes: 

"  For  God  defend,  that  we  should  publish  the  airy  dreams  of  our 
own  fancy,  for  the  real  ideas  of  the  world.  But  rather  may  He  be 
so  graciously  propitious  unto  us,  that  we  may  write  the  Apocalypse, 
and  true  visions  of  the  impressions  and  signets  of  the  Creator  upon 
His  creature!  "    (p.  38  Preface,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 

"  Neither  are  all  these  whereof  we  have  spoken,  and  others  of 
like  nature,  mere  similitudes  only,  as  men  of  narrow  observation 
perchance  may  conceive,  but  of  the  very  same  footsteps,  and  seals 
of  Nature,  printed  upon  several  subjects  or  matter.^'  (p.  135,  Lib. 
iii..  Advancement  of  Learning.) 

This  metaphor  of  printing  and  sealing  (signets)  upon  matter 
may  be  seen  to  be  repeated  in  the  play  quoted,  as  by  Bacon.  The 
Dead  were  classically  called  Demetrians,  as  subject  to  matter,  over 
whom  Demeter,  the  earth  goddess,  presided. 

Existence  is  a  coin  with  two  faces.  On  one  side  is  matter  or 
phenomena,  on  the  other  side  rationalism.  A  child  untaught  sees 
in  letter-press,  only  certain  uniform  figures,  the  adult  sees  only  the 
meaning.  In  the  same  way.  Bacon,  like  Robert  Fludd,  the  great 
Rosicrucian,  always  regards  nature  as  a  volume  of  God^s  creatures, 
as  a  text,  in  which  very  few  can  read,  but  whose  spirit  is  at  the  bot- 


138  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

torn  of  everything.  I  take  it,  with  this  idea  firmly  fixed  in  his  mind, 
he  set  to  work  to  illustrate  the  "  Book  of  Nature,"  by  another 
"  Book  of  Nature,"  with  a  spiritual  meaning  behind  it  —  Shake- 
speare's so-called  plays, —  the  1623  folio  —  "  PhilosoDhical  Play  Sys- 
tems," as  he  terms  them. 
Bacon  writes : 

"  To  close  in  a  word,  let  no  man,  upon  a  weak  conceit  of  sobriety 
or  ill- applied  moderation,  think  or  maintain  that  a  man  can  search 
too  far,  or  be  too  well  studied  in  the  Booh  of  God's  Word,  or  in  the 
Book  of  God^s  Works.''^    (Lib.  i.  p.  9,  Advancement  of  Learning.) 

"  First,  the  volume  of  Scriptures,  which  reveal  the  will  of  God; 
then  the  volume  of  creatures,  which  express  His  power. "  (Lib. 
p.  47,  Advancement  of  Learning.) 

It  is  the  Hermetic,  or  concealed  spiritual  meaning,  which  is 
stamped  upon  nature  and  phenomena,  upon  the  reverse  side  of  the 
coin  of  nature,  or  its  visible  text.  The  name  Hermia  carries  a  sus- 
picious root  origin  and  affinity  to  the  Greek  verb  to  ''interpret,"  and 
means  anything  concealed.  She  is  in  love  with  Lysander,  but  her 
father's  creative  purpose  is  she  should  be  crossed  in  her  desires,  and 
not  wed  with  her  natural  affinity,  but  rather  with  Demetrius,  whom 
she  loaths,  as  the  very  pole  opposite  to  her.  Here  let  me  remark, 
philosophically  existence  has  its  root  essence  in  the  marriage  of  con- 
tradictions, or  out  of  antagonism;  that  is,  out  of  conflict,  or  opposi- 
tion of  mind  and  matter.  This  crossing  springing  out  of  a  father's 
purpose,  is  the  basis  of  the  action  of  the  play,  as  far  as  the  two  pair 
of  lovers  are  concerned. 

Hermia.    0  Cross !  too  high  to  be  enthrall'd  to  low. 
Lysander.    Or  else  misgraffed  in  respect  of  years. 
Hermia.    0  spite !  too  old  to  be  engaged  to  young. 
Lysander.    Or  else  it  stood  upon  the  choice  of  friends. 
Hermia.    0  Hell!  to  choose  love  by  another  eye.    (Act  i.) 

Here  let  me  remark  that  the  whole  of  Shakespeare's  style,  (if  it  be 
Shakespeare's,)  is  antithetical,  and  he  delights  in  the  union  of  con- 
traries, amounting  to  paradox,  just  as  Bacon  reveals  in  his  Antitheta, 
'*  For  who  knows  not  if  the  doctrine  of  contraries  be  not  the  same," 
writes  Bacon.  In  this  play  we  are  discussing  this  doctrine  of  para- 
dox is  very  strongly  visible  in  the  text.  Theseus  exclaims  (in 
scene  1,  act  v 

"  Merry  and  tragical !  Tedious  and  brief* 
That  is  hot  ice  and  wondrous  strange  snow 
How  shall  we  find  the  concord  of  this  discord?  " 

(Act  V.  1.) 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  139 

It  is  impossible  to  imagine  a  world  constructed  out  of  one  princi- 
ple. Just  as  art  consists  of  light  and  shadow,  so  the  world  reveals 
in  winter  and  summer,  heat  and  cold,  night  and  day,  gravity  and 
centrifugal  force,  love  and  hate,  an  everlasting  opposition  which 
continually  run  into  each  other.  The  magianism  of  Zoraster,  and 
of  the  Manichees,  was  adopted  by  the  Rosicrucians,  and  Bacon,  in 
his  discussion  upon  the  Persian  magic,  evidently  was  imbued  with 
this  philosophy,  which  Heraclitus  and  Empedocles  strongly  enforced 
and  delivered,  and  wh'ch  may  be  summed  up  in  the  words  of  the 
former,  *'  War  is  father  of  all  things,"  Bacon  repeats  this  in  the 
words,  "  Strife  and  friendship  are  the  spurs  of  action  and  the  Jcei/s 
0/ works." 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Bacon's  New  World  of  Sciences. 

I  think  I  am  right  in  saying,  the  general  public  imagine  this 
problem  of  the  Bacon-Shakespeare  authorship,  revolves  only  upon  a 
question  of  names,  as  to  who  really  wrote  the  1623  folio  plays. 
Interesting  as  such  a  literary  acrostic  might  be,  I  myself  think  very 
little  of  it,  and  don't  see  what  is  particularly  gained  by  a  change  of 
names,  seeing  a  rose  is  just  as  sweet  by  any  other  name.  The 
object  of  this  work  is  to  suggest  in  a  humble  way  (and  very  incom- 
pletely, it  must  be  confessed,  but  to  the  best  of  my  powers),  that  the 
folio  plays  are  symbolical,  and  examples  of  Bacon's  inductive  system, 
to  which  they  are  wedded  by  means  of  every  sort  of  syllogism, 
analogy  and  parallel,  joined  to  a  great  system  of  cipher.  This 
assumption  must,  in  its  initial  statement,  excite  incredulity  and 
laughter,  and  I  am  not  unprepared  for  it.  If  I  had  heard,  a  few 
years  ago,  such  a  theory,  I  might  have  myself  smiled  at  such  an 
airy  flight  of  imagination.  But  I  have  well  weighed  the  evidence 
presented  by  the  most  extraordinary  book  in  the  world.  Bacon's 
De  Augmentis  of  1623,  and  particularly  its  supposed  translation  by 
Wats  of  1640,  which  I  believe  is  the  real  original  English  version  first 
written  by  Bacon,  and  from  which  the  former  was  translated  into 
Latin.     (For  which  proofs  see  my  work,  Hermes  Stella.) 

Bacon  speaks  of  this  work  as  a  key  for  the  better  "  opening  up 
of  the  Instauration.^^  Without  the  reader  knowing  this  work,  it  is 
impossible  to  convey  the  slightest  idea  of  its  scope,  chacacter  and 
mystery.  One  of  its  most  striking  features  is  its  praetermitted 
parts.  Deficients,  or  Sciences,  which  are  fifty  in  number,  and  which 
are  catalogued  at  the  end  of  the  work,  as  A  New  World  of 
Sciences.  It  has  generally  been  understood  these  Deficients  are  only 
sciences.  Bacon  proposed  the  world  should  augment  and  perfect. 
But  this  idea,  (though  possibly  in  some  few  particular  cases  correct), 
cannot  be  applied  to  many  of  them,  and  in  no  way  whatever 
applies  to  some.  Bacon  evidently  wrote  guardedly  and  with  reserve 
upon  these  Deficients.  He  took  even  pains  to  conceal  some  of  their 
real  titles,  and  it  was  long  before  I  recognized  the  true  character  of 
some  of  them,  though  well  acquainted  with  the  work.    They  are 

140 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEEATUBE. 


141 


really,  just  those  dangerous  subjects,  allied  to  Bacon's  secret  inten- 
tions and  reserved  plans,  which  cover  under  a  fictitious  disguise  the 
entire  Instauration.  A  great  many  of  these  Deficients  belong  to 
Bacon's  completed  works,  others  leave  us  completely  in  the  dark, 
but  they  are  all  introduced  with  a  profound  object  and  plan,  only 
hinted  at  in  the  darkest  possible  language.  As  this  statement  may 
arouse  scepticism,  I  will  here  introduce  the  catalogue  titles  of  this 
New  World  of  Sciences. 

A  NEW 

WOELD  OF  SCIENCES, 

OR  THE 

DEFICIEI^TS. 


LIB.  II. 

*  Erkoees  Nature  or  the  His- 
tory of  Preter  —  Generations. 
Cap.  2.  Sect.  3. 

*  ViNCULA  Nature,  Experi- 
mentall  or  Mechanical  History. 
Cap.  2.  Sect.  4. 

*  HiSTORiA  Inductiva,  Nat- 
urall  History  for  the  building  up 
of  Philosophy.    Cap.  3.  Sect.  1. 

*  OcuLUS  PoLY^EMi,  Or  the 
History  of  Learning  from  age  to 
age.    C.  4.  Sect.  1. 

*  HiSTORIA    AD     P.HOPHETIAS, 

The  History  of  Prophesy.  C.  11. 
Sect.  2. 

*  Sapientia  Veterum,  Philos- 
ophy according  to  ancient  para- 
bles.   C.  13.  S.  3. 

LIB.  III. 

*  Philosophia  Prima,  Or  the 
Common  and  Generall  Axioms 
of  Sciences.    Cap.  1.  Sect.  3. 


*  AsTRONOMiA  Viva,  Living 
Astronomy.     Cap.  4.  Sect.  3.  $  1. 

*  AsTROLOGiA  Sana.  Sound 
Astrologie.     Cap.  4.  Sect.  3.  $.  2. 

*  Problemes  Naturall,  a  con- 
tinuation thereof.   Cap.  4.  Sect.  5. 

*  Placites  Of  ancient  Philoso- 
phers.   Cap.  4.  Sect.  5.  §.  1. 

*  FoRM^  Rerum:  a  part  of 
Metaphysique  of  the  Forms  of 
things.    Cap.  4.  Sect.  6. 

*  Magia  Naturalis,  or  the 
setting  of  Formes  on  work.  Cap. 
5.  S.  1.  $.  1. 

*  Inventarium  Opum  Hu- 
man arum,  An  Inventary  of  the 
Estate  of  Man.    Cap.  5.  Sect.  2. 

*  Catalogus  Polychresto- 
RUM,  a  Catalogue  of  Things  of 
multifarious  use  and  application. 
Cap.  5.  Sect.  2.  $.  1. 


142 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 


LIB.  IV. 

*  Triumphi  Hominis,  or  of  th  e 
SuMMiTiES  and  highest  pitch  of 
Humane  Nature.  Cap.  1.  Sect.  2. 
$.2. 

*  Phtsiognomia  Corporis  in 
MoTU,  a  Physicall  discovery  of 
the  Body  upon  Motion.  Cap.  1. 
Sect.  3.  $.  1. 

*  Narrationes  Medicinales, 
Medicinal  Reports,  or  Historical! 
observations  in  Physique.  Cap.  2. 
Sect.  3.  $.  1. 

*  Anatomia  Comparata, 
Comparative  Anatomy.  Cap.  2. 
Sect.  3.  $.  2. 

*  MORBI  INSANABILES,   Of   the 

curing  of  Diseases  counted  incur- 
able.   Cap.  2.  Sect.  2.  $.  5. 

*  De  Euthanasia  exteriore, 
Of  a  faire  and  easy  outward  pas- 
sage out  of  life.  Cap.  2.  Sect.  3. 
§.6. 

*  Of  AuTHENTiQUE  and  ap- 
proved Medicines.  Cap.  2.  Sect. 
3.  $.  7. 

*  Artificiall  Imitation  of 
Naturall  Bathes.    C.  2.  Sect.  3. 

*  FiLUM  Medicinale,  An  or- 
derly course  and  sequele  in  Phys- 
ique.   Cap.  2.  S.  3.  $.  9. 

*  Prolongation  of  the  space 
or  course  of  life.    C.  2.  Sect.  4. 

*  Of  the  substance  of  the  Sensi- 
ble, or  meerely  producted  Soule. 
Cap.  3.  Sect.  1. 

*  Of  the  impulsion  of  the  Spirit 


in  voluntary  Motion.  Cap.  3. 
Sect.  3.  $.  1. 

*  Of  the  Difference  between 
Perception  &  Sence.  Cap.  3.  Sect. 
3.  $.  1.- 

*  Radix  Perspective,  The 
originall  of  the  Perspectives,  or 
of  the  Forme  of  Light.  Cap.  3. 
Sect.  3.  $.  4. 

LIB.  V. 

*  Venatio  Panis,  Or  Literate 
experience.  Cap.  2.  Sect.  1.  $.  1. 2. 

*  Organum  Novum,  or  true 
Directions  for  the  Interpretation 
of  Nature.    Cap.  1.  Sect.  3  $.  ult. 

*  Topics  Particulares,  Or. 
Places  of  Invention,  appropriate 
to  Particular  subjects  and  sci- 
ences.    Cap.  3.  Sect.  2.  $.  1. 

*  Elenchus  Idolorum,  Soph- 
isme-Images,  imposed  upon  the 
understanding  from  the  nature 
of  Man,  Oenerall,  Particular,  or 
Communicative.    Cap.  4.  Sect.  3. 

*  Analogie  Of  Demonsrta- 
TiONS  according  to  the  nature  of 
the  subject.    Cap.  4.  Sect.  4. 

LIB.  VI. 

*  Notes  Or  Impressions  Of 
Things,  from  Congruity,  or  from 
ad  Placitum.    Cap.  1.  Sect.  1.  $.  2. 

*  A  Philosophicall  Gram- 
mar, Or  the  Analogy  between 
words  &  Things.  Cap.  1.  Sect. 
2.  $.  L 

*  Traditio  Lampadis,  Or  the 
Method  deliver'd  unto  the  sonnes 
of  Wisdome.    Cap.  2.  Sect.  1.  $.  1. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE. 


143 


*  Of  The  Wisdom  of  Private 
Speech  ;  Or  respective  Deliveries 
of  a  mans  selfe.  Cap.  3.  Sect.  1. 
$.  1. 

*  The  Colours  of  G-ood  and 
Evill  in  Apparance,  simple  and 
compar'd.    Cap.  3.  Sect.  2.  $.  1. 

*  Antitheta  Kerum,  the  Con- 
tre-positio  of  things.  Cap.  3. 
Sect.  3. 

*  Formula  Minores,  lesser 
formes  or  stiles  of  speech.  Cap. 
3.  Sect.  4. 

LIB.  VII. 

*  Satyra  Seria,  or  of  the 
subtile  Reaches,  Cautels,  and  im- 
postures in  professions.  Cap.  2. 
Sect.  3.  $.  3. 

*  GrEORGiCA  Animi,  the  culturc 
of  the  mind.     Cap.  3.  Sect.  1. 

LIB.  VIII. 

*  Amanuensis    Vit^,    or    of 


Sparsed  Occasions. 
L  $.  1. 


Cap.  2.  Sect. 


*  Faber  Fortune,  the  Con- 
triver of  Fortune;  or  the  course 
of  Life  for  advancement.  Cap.  2. 
Sect.  1. 

*  Consul  Paludatus;  Or  the 
Art  of  enlarging  the  bounds  of  a 
Kingdome  or  State.  Cap.  3.  Sect.  1. 

*  Idea  Justiti^  Univer- 
salis; or  the  Fountains  of  Law. 
Cap.  3.  Sect.  2. 

LIB.  IX. 

*  Sophron;  Or  of  theright  use 
of  Humane  Reason  in  Matters 
Divine.     Cap.  1.  S.  1. 

*  Iren^us,  Or  of  the  degrees 
of  Unity  in  the  Citty  of  God. 
Cap.  1.  Sect.  1. 

*  Utres  Ccelestes;  or  the 
Emanations  of  SS.  Scriptures. 
Cap.  1.  Sect.  3. 

(1640,  Advancement  of  Learn- 
ing.) 


Take  the  first,  Bacon's  Mechanical  History.  What  it 
really  is,  nobody  can  tell  us.  Or  what  is  his  Magia  Naturalis, 
or  tJie  Setting  of  Forms  on  Work  f  What  literary  man  will  kindly 
explain  to  us  Bacon's  object  or  intentions,  with  regard  to  Venatio 
Panis  or  Literate  Experience,  or  what  is  signified  by  his  Topics 
Particulares,  or  Places  of  Invention  (discovery),  or  by  Traditio 
Lampadis,  or  the  method  delivered  unto  the  Sons  of  Wisdom  f  Or  by 
the  Wisdom  of  Private  Speech  ?  Nobody  can  throw  one  ray  of  hght 
on  these  subjects,  except  to  charge  Bacon  with  his  own  ignorance ! 
A  study  of  the  text,  where  these  subjects  are  introduced  and  dis- 
cussed, only  thickens  the  darkness,  though  it  is  plain  the  writer  is 
master  of  his  subject,  is  cautiously  reserved,  and  alluding  to  matters 
rather  implied  than  stated.  What  right  have  we  to  arrogate  our 
ignorance  to  the  author  of  these  Deficients?  Why  should  Bacon 
introduce  those  curious  cipher  and  secret-knowledge  methods  of  the 


144  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE, 

sixth  book,  —  Notes  or  impressions  of  things,  from  congruity,  and 
A  Philosophical  Grammar  (being  the  thirty-fiftb  and  tbirty-sixtli 
Deficients  in  order  of  the  catalogue)  ?  Why,  indeed,  should  the 
Instauration  require  ciphers  to  open  it,  seeing  Bacon  denies  their 
introduction  in  order  to  swell  his  muster-roll  of  sciences'?  (p.  270.) 
What  does  Bacon  conceal  under  private  speech,  to  whom  does  he 
prepare  to  talk  privately?  Why  should  it  require  prudence'^  All 
this  to  the  reader  unacquainted  with  the  work,  may  appear  simply 
super-subtle  trifling  on  my  part.  But  he  would  change  his 
opinion,  after  a  few  hours'  serious  study  of  the  text  in  connection 
with  these  subjects.  Why  did  Bacon  select  in  this  work  a  style 
that  was  to  choose  its  reader,  and  purposely  write  obscurely,  as  he 
states  to  Doctor  Playfer  ?  How  can  these  subjects  assist  in  opening 
the  Instauration,  which  is  commonly  held  to  be  allied  only  to  nature 
and  inductive  science  ?  Why  introduce  poetry  as  one  of  the  great 
bases  of  the  work,  from  which  and  with  which  the  entire  Instauration 
is  bound  up  ?  What  is  meant  by  Amanuensis  Yit^  or  of  sparsed 
occasions?  It  is  easy  to  blanch  these  obscurities  and  discourse 
upon  the  plain,  but  behind  each  of  these  subjects  is  a  great  plan 
and  a  great  mystery,  also  an  entire  whole  and  systematic  logic 
affiliating  one  part  to  the  other.  In  short,  I  maintain  this  work  was 
written  expressly  for  the  purpose  of  not  only  establishing  Bacon's 
authorship  right  to  the  1623  plays,  but  also  for  discovery  of  the 
symbolism  of  those  same  plays,  by  means  of  induction  leading  us  on 
step  by  step  from  one  discovery  to  the  other.  The  reader  will  per- 
ceive the  Sixth  Deficient  is  entitled  Sapientia  Veterum;  that  is. 
Bacon's  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients.  This  subject  is  introduced  page 
108,  on  the  heels  of  stage  plays  (p.  107),  and  betrays  its  object 
out  of  hand;  that  is,  the  application  of  the  entire  collection  to 
the  stage  plays  of  the  1623  theatre.  The  forty-second  Deficient, 
Satyra  Seria,  is  undoubtedly  Bacon's  Essays,  disguised  under 
this  strange  name.  Then  we  find  the  Organtjm  Novum,  but 
why  it  should  be  included  in  this  work  is  a  mystery,  unless 
we  believe  it  is  to  be  used  in  relationship  to  discoveries  allied 
to  the  entire  Instauration  as  a  whole.  Let  the  reader  reflect  over 
the  fact,  Bacon's  secret  methods  of  tradition,  or  of  delivering 
secret  knowledge,  belong  and  are  included  in  this  New  World  of 
Sciences.  In  Bacon's  age  secret  writing  was  nothing  new,  and  are 
we  sure  these  ciphers  of  Bacon's  do  not  and  will  not  lead  to  the  dis- 
covery of  the  real  meaning  of  his  New  World  of  Sciences  f  Few  of 
the  subjects  of  this  catalogue  are  really  sciences  at  all,  in  the  proper 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEM ATUBE.  145 

sense  of  tlie  term,  as  may  be  seen  in  the  including  of  his  Sapientia 
Veterum,  or  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients,  his  Colors  of  Good  and  EvU, 
his  TopiccB  Particulares  (or  Places  of  Invention),  his  Venatio  PaniSj 
and  many  others  in  this  catalogue.  They  are  all  really,  I  maintain, 
secret  parts  of  the  Instauration,  belonging  to  the  intellectual  glob© 
or  interpretation  of  the  plays,  which  Bacon  was  obliged  to  leave 
half  obscured  in  esoteric  language,  which  sharpness  of  wit  was 
to  discover  through  time.  They  are  introduced  in  the  text  of  th^ 
Be  Augment  is,  in  just  such  relationship  to  the  entire  work  as  a  whole, 
as  may  become  emergent  upon  discovery  and  practice.  A  proper 
comprehension,  use,  application  and  interpretation  of  the  real 
significance  of  these  New  World  of  Sciences,  will  open  up  the  entire 
Instauration. 

There  are  only  thirty-five  plays  registered  in  the  catalogue  of  the 
1623  first  edition  Folio  Plays.  Troilus  and  Cressida,  though  in  the 
volume  (with  only  one  page  numbered)  is,  for  some  purpose,  left  out 
of  the  catalogue,  which  the  reflective  reader  cannot  believe  was  an 
accident.  There  are,  therefore,  really  thirty-six  plays  in  the  Folio 
1623  edition  plays.  I  have  found  these  two  numbers,  playing  such 
a  frequent  and  important  part,  in  my  cipher  discoveries,  either 
with  regard  to  the  text  in  connection  with  the  paging,  or  in  words 
italicised,  that  I  have  come  to  the  certain  conviction,  this  omission 
of  Troilus  and  Cressida  from  the  catalogue,  was  expressly  done  to 
furnish  two  cipJier  numbers,  35  and  36.  Their  sum  is  71,  and  this  is 
a  frequent  number  (upon  some  pages  of  the  1640  Advancement  of 
Learning)  of  words  italicised.  Shakespeare  likewise  furnishes  in 
his  completed  years,  and  year  just  entered  (1616)  when  he  died,  the 
the  two  numbers  52,  53.  Bacon,  in  like  manner,  was  55  and  56  the 
same  year,  1616,  and  62,  63  in  1623.  Now,  I  am  about  to  point  out  tp 
the  reader,  that  the  two  Deficients  of  Bacon's  New  World  of  ScienceSf 
entitled  Notes  of  THijfGS  and  Philosophical  Gbammar,  are 
also  the  thirty-fifth  and  thirty-sixth  in  order  of  the  catalogue  I  have 
given,  counted  from  the  commencement.  Now,  it  is  important  the 
reader  should  understand  what  these  subjects  treat  of.  They  belong 
to  the  sixth  book  of  the  Be  Augmentis,  which  treats  of 
Tradition  (which  Bacon  explains  as  secret  knowledge,  on 
pages  258,  259  Advancement  of  Learning ,  1640).  What  Bacou 
intends  to  suggest  is,  we  should  take  Notes  from  congruity  of  numbers^ 
from  figures,  pagings,  and,  above  all,  to  note  this  is  the  thirty- 
fifth  Deficient.  This  is  one  of  his  methods  of  traditive  knowledge, 
or  handing  on  to  the  interpreter  the  things  invented.    This  is  <me 


146  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

of  the  Deficients  which  is  to  open  up  Bacon's  New  World  of  Sciences, 
if  properly  understood  and  applied..  The  reader  may,  perhaps, 
dimly  apprehend  my  somewhat  too  ambitious  title  to  this  work,  the 
Columbus  of  Literature,  when  I  maintain  these  Deficients, 
(and  particularly  the  thirty-fifth  and  thirty-sixth),  are  intended  to 
open  up  by  cipher  the  new  world,  or  intellectual  hemisphere  of 
Bacon's  entire  Instauration,  of  which  the  plays  are  the  old  world, 
and  this  book  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning,  from  which  I  quote, 
is  the  ship  (or  ark  if  we  like)  sailing  and  carrying  the  precious  argosy 
of  discovery.  It  was  written  as  a  great  key-book  for  the  better 
opening  up  of  the  globe  theater  plays.  This  theory  may  not  be 
proved  by  me,  but  it  will  be  by  others.  On  the  title-page  engraving, 
the  reader  may  perceive  Bacon's  design,  prefigured  by  the  two 
globes,  joining  hands  (the  old  world  and  the  new),  with  the  ship 
beneath,  passing  or  about  to  pass  the  pillars  of  Hercules  (Gibraltar) 
for  America.  Now  the  reader  is  about  to  see  from  Bacon's 
text,  touching  this  thirty-fifth  Deficient  of  his  Netv  World  of  Sciences, 
how  it  deals  with  Notes  of  Things  from  Congruity  of  Numbers,  and 
therefore  I  claim  right  in  postulating  cipher  proof  by  agreement 
(or  congruity)  of  mathematical  numbers. 

"  §  Notes  therefore  of  things,  which  without  the  helpe  and  media- 
tion of  Words  signifie  Things,  are  of  two  sorts  ;  whereof  the  first  sort 
is  significant  of  Congruitie ;  the  other  ad  placitum.  Of  the  former 
sort  are  Hieroglyphiques  and  Gestures ;  of  the  later  are  those  which 
we  call  Characters  Reall.  The  use  of  Hieroglyphiques  is  very 
ancient,  and  had  in  a  kind  of  Veneration ;  especially  amongst  the 
Egyptians,  one  of  the  most  Ancient  Nations :  So  that  Hieroglyph- 
iques seem  to  have  bin  a  first-borne  writing,  and  elder  than  the  Ele- 
ments of  Letters;  unlesse,  it  maybe,  the  Letters  of  the  Ebrews. 
As  for  Gestures  they  are,  as  it  were,  Transitory  Hieroglyphiques. 
For  as  words  pronounced  vanish,  writings  remaine ;  so  Hieroglyph- 
iques expressed  by  Gestures,  are  transient,  but  Painted,  permanent. 
As  when  Periander  being  consulted  with,  how  to  preserve  a  Tyranny, 
bid  the  Messenger  stand  still,  and  he  walking  in  a  Garden,  topt  all 
the  highest  Flowers ;  signifying  the  cutting  of,  and  the  keeping  low 
of  the  Nobility ;  did  as  well  make  use  of  a  Hieroglyphique,  as  if  he 
had  drawne  the  same  upon  Paper.  This  in  the  meane  is  plain,  that 
Hieroglyphiques  and  Gestures  ever  have  some  similitude  with  the 
the  thing  signified,  and  are  kind  of  Emblemes;  wherefore  we  have 
named  them  the  Notes  of  things  from  Congruitie.  But  Characters 
Reall  have  nothing  of  Embleme  in  them ;  but  are  plainly  dumbe 
and  dead  Figures,  as  the  Elements  of  Letters  are ;  and  only 
devised  ad  Placitum,  and  confirmed  by  Custome,  as  by  a  tacite  agree- 
ment. And  it  is  manifest  also  that  there  must  needs  be  a  vast 
number  of  them  for  writing ,  at  lest  so  many  as  there  are  Radicall 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  147 

words.  Wherefore  this  portion  of  Knowledge  concerning  the  Organ 
of  Speech,  which  is  of  the  Notes  of  Things,  we  report  as  Deficient. 
And  though  it  may  seeme  of  no  great  use,  considering  that  Words  & 
writings  by  Letters  are  the  most  apt  Organs  of  Tradition ;  yet  we 
thought  good  to  make  mention  of  it  here,  as  of  a  knowledge  not  to 
he  despised.  For  we  here  handle,  as  it  were,  the  Coynes  of  things 
Intellectuall ;  and  it  will  not  be  amisse  to  know,  that  as  Money  may 
be  made  of  other  matter  besides  Gold  and  Silver ;  so  there  may  be 
stamped  other  Notes  of  things  besides  Words  and  Letters. " 

Now,  let  us  take  the  next  Deficient,  the  thirty-sixth,  correspond- 
ing with  the  whole  number  of  plays  in  the  1623  folio. 

"  ^  We  will  divide  G- rammer  into  two  sorts,  whereof  the  one  is 
Literary ;  the  other  Philosophicall.  The  one  is  meerly  apphed  to 
Languages,  that  they  may  be  more  speedily  learned ;  or  more  cor- 
rectedly  and  purely  spoken.  The  other  in  a  sort  doth  minister,  and 
is  subservient  to  Philosophic.  In  this  later  part  which  is  Philosoph- 
icall, we  find  that  Caesar  writ  Books  De  Analogia;  and  it  is  a 
question  whether  those  Books  handled  this  Philsophicall  Crammer 
whereof  we  speake?  Our  opinion  is  that  there  was  not  any  high 
and  subtile  matter  in  them,  but  only  that  they  deliver'd  Precepts  of 
a  pure  and  perfect  speech,  not  depraved  by  popular  Custome;  nor 
corrupted  and  polluted  by  over- curious  affectation;  in  which  kind 
Caesar  excelFd.  Notwithstanding,  admonish't  by  such  a  worke,  we 
have  conceiv'd  and  comprehended  in  our  mind,  a  kind  of  Grammer, 
that  may  diligently  enquire,  not  the  Analogic  of  words  one  with 
another,  but  the  Analogic  between  Words  and  Things,  or  Reason; 
besides  that  Interpretation  of  Nature,  which  is  subordinate  to 
Logique.  Surely  Words  are  the  foot-steps  of  Eeason;  and  foot- 
steps doe  give  some  indications  of  the  Body;  wherefore  we  will 
give  some  general  description  of  this."    {lb.  pages  261-262.) 

I  refer  the  reader  to  page  53  of  this  work,  reproduced,  where  he 
will  find  CcBsar^s  Analogy  introduced  upon  the  mispaged  53,  show- 
ing Bacon  gives  us  a  sly  hint  for  this  Philosophical  Grammar,  upon 
a  page  carrying  Shakespeare's  age  53  and  Bacon's  age,  (full  age,  or 
completed  years)  in  1616,  viz.,  55,  masking  each  other!  The 
reader  may  see  this  Philosophical  Grammar,  consists  chiefly  of 
Analogy,  that  is,  of  resemblances,  by  parallel,  and  does  not  apply 
to  languages,  but  to  a  strictly  philosophical  method  of  hunting  out 
by  means  of  Notes  of  Things,  and  quick-sightedness,  the  analogy 
between  words  and  things.  These  words,  these  things,  may  be 
seen,  are  subordinate  to  logic  or  the  footsteps  of  reason.  I  main- 
tain stoutly,  all  this  refers  to  the  Philosophical  Grammar  scene 
upon  page  53  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  where  the  pronoun  HiCf 


148  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

H(Bc,  Hoc,  is  declined  and  identified  in  the  accusative  case,  by- 
travesty  with  Bacon  in  the  line  : 

Hang  Hog  is  Latin  for  Bacon  I  warrant  you. 
The  words  Hang  Hog  are  twice  repeated  together  thus  : 

Evans.    I  pray  you,  have  you  your  remembrance,  child : 
Accusative,  Jdng^  hang,  Jiog: 

Quickly.    Hang- Hog  is  Latin  for  Bacon  I  warrant  you. 

(P.  53,  M.  W.  W.) 

The  words  hang-hog,  are  the  thirty-fifth  and  thirty-sixth  in 
italics,  counted  down  this  column  106  of  the  comedies,  and  261 
and  262  all  counted  down,  agreeing  with  the  page  from  which  the  last 
passage  cited  (from  Bacon^s  Advancement  of  Learning,  viz.,  261,  262,) 
on  which  this  Philosophical  Grammar,  or  the  thirty-sixth  Deficient 
of  A  New  World  of  Sciences  is  continued.  This  is  just  an  example  of 
what  Bacon  means  by  Notes  of  things  from  congriiity.  I  wish  the 
reader  could  see  the  work,  or  I  could  present  it  to  him,  he  would 
indeed  be  speedily  convinced.  For  the  great  page  of  cipher,  Bacon 
gives,  as  example  of  his  bi-literal  alphabet,  is  upon  pages  267,  263, 
269,  agreeing  with  the  words  ^'  For  Bacon  I, "  or  "  Latin  for  Bacon, " 
in  the  line  quoted,  which  are  exactly  266,  267,  268,  or  267,  268,  269, 
just  as  we  count  the  second  hyphenated  word  hang-hog,  singly 
or  doubly  (see  column  106  M.  W.  W.  reproduced).  Mr.  Ignatius 
Donnelly  has  seen  this  proof  of  congruity.  Mr.  Francis  J.  Schulte,  of 
Chicago,  possesses  a  copy  of  this  rare  work  (almost  unknown)  which 
I  was  happy  to  be  able  to  persuade  him  to  purchase.  I  hope  he 
will  reprint  it,  and  give  the  great  American  public  the  opportunity 
of  possessing,  certainly  the  most  extraordinary  book  in  the  world, 
to  which  they  hold  a  special  right,  inasmuch  as  it  was  designed  to 
cross  the  seas  and  open  up  Bacon's  new  world  of  sciences, —  the 
America  of  his  inductive  system  applied  to  the  plays.  A  great  deal 
of  all  this  I  am  striving  to  draw  attention  to,  has  already  been  pub- 
lished by  me  in  Hermes  Stella,  and  in  Francis  Bacon,  my  last  work, 
but,  like  trying  to  sell  bank  notes  for  a  song,  it  goes  by  unheeded, 
just  because  the  world  won't  examine  it,  and  won't  believe  in  it,  and 
the  book  itself  is  almost  unattainable.  It  is  really  the  original 
English  version  of  the  De  Augmentis,  which  Bacon  held  back  for  fear 
of  premature  discovery  of  his  cipher  secret,  and  published  posthu- 
mously. For  this  see  proofs  in  Hermes  Stella.  No  words  or  quoted 
matter,  can  carry  the  weight  the  work  itself  does,  and  the  public 
will  question  all  assertions  of  this  sort,  or  cipher  counts,  until  proved 
by  authority. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEMATUBE.  149 

I  now  give  page  264  of  this  same  tidrty- sixth  Deficient  or  Fhilo- 
sopJdcal  Grammar,  whereon  the  reader  will  perceive  poetry  intro- 
ducing us  to  ciphers.  And  here  let  me  state  the  printers  have  the 
pages  quoted  from  before  them,  and  there  can  be  no  cooking  of  fig- 
ures, that  common  charge  brought  against  every  author  on  this 
subject.    From  page  263  : 

III  But  the  measure  of  words  hath  brought  us  forth  an  im- 
mense body  of  Art,  namely  Poesie ;  not  in  respect  of  the  matter  (of 
which  we  have  spoken  before)  but  in  respect  of  stile  and  the  forme 
of  words,  as  Metre  or  Yerse ;  touching  which  the  Art  is  very  small 
and  briefe,  but  the  accesse  of  examples  large  and  infinite.  Neither 
ought  that  Art  (which  the  Grammarians  call  Prosodia)  to  be  only 
restrained  to  the  kinds  and  measures  of  Verse ;  for  there  are  Precepts 
to  be  annext,  what  kind  of  Verse  best  fitteth  every  matter  or  sub- 
ject. The  Ancients  applied  Heroicall  Verse  to  Histories  and  Lau- 
datories;  Elegies  to  Lamentations;  lambiques  to  Invectives; 
Lyriques  to  Songs  and  Hymnes.  And  this  wisdome  of  the  Ancients 
is  not  wanting  in  the  Poets  of  later  Ages  in  Mother-tongues ;  only 
this  is  to  be  reprehended,  that  some  of  them  too  studious  of  An- 
tiquity have  endeavoured  to  draw  moderne  Languages  to  Ancient 
Measures  (as  Heroique ;  Elegiaque;  Saphique,  and  the  rest)  which 
the  fabrique  and  composition  of  those  Languages,  will  not  beare ; 
and  withall  is  no  lesse  harsh  unto  the  eare.  In  matters  of  this  Na- 
ture the  judgment  of  sense  is  to  be  preferred  bsfore  precepts  of  Art, 
as  he  saith, 

Coenae  Fercula  nostra3 

Mallem  Convivis  quam  placuisse  Cocis. 

Nor  is  this  Art,  but  the  abuse  of  Art,  seeing  it  doth  not  perfect, 
but   perverts  Nature.      As  for  Poesie   (whether    we  speak e    of 

264  Or  The  Advancement. 


Fables,  or  Metre)  it  is,  as  we  have  said  before,  as  a  Luxuriant 
Herb  brought  forth  without  seed,  and  springs  up  from  the  strength 
and  ranknesse  of  the  soyle.  Wherefore  it  runs  along  every  where, 
and  is  so  amply  spread,  as  it  were  a  superfluous  labour  to  be  curious 
of  any  DEFiciEjjfTS  therein;  the  care  therefore  for  this  is  taken 
already. 

$  As  for  Accents  of  Words,  there  is  no  need,  that  wee  speake  of 
so  small  a  matter;  unlefife,  perchance,  some  may  think  it  worth  the 
noting,  that  there  hath  bin  exact  observation  made  of  the  Accents 
of  Words,  but  not  of  the  Accents  of  Sentences;  yet  this,  for  most 
part,  is  the  generall  Custome  of  all  men,  that  in  the  close  of  a 
Period  they  let  fall  their  voice,  in  a  demand  they  raise  it,  and  many 
such  like  usages. 

$  As  for  writing,  that  is  perform'd  either  by  the  vulgar  Alphabet, 
which  is  everywhere  receiv'd;  or  by  a  secret  and  private  Alphabet, 


150  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

which  men  agree  upon  between  themselves,  which  they  call  Cyphers. 
But  the  Vulgar  Orthography  hath  brought  forth  unto  us  a  Con- 
troversie,  and  Question,  namely,  Whether  words  should  be  written 
as  they  are  spoken,  or  rather  after  the  usual  manner.  But  this  kind 
of  writing,  which  seemes  to  be  reformed,  which  is,  that  writing 
should  be  consonant  to  speaking,  is  a  branch  of  unprofitable  sub- 
telties;  for  Pronunciation  itself  every  day  encreases  and  alters  the 
fashion;  and  the  derivation  of  words,  especially  from  forrain 
Languages,  are  utterly  defac'd  and  extinguisbt.  In  briefe,  seeing 
writing,  according  to  the  receiv'd  Custome,  doth  no  way  prejudice 
the  manner  of  speaking,  to  what  end  should  this  innovation  be 
brought  in? 

$  Wherefore  let  us  come  to  Ctphars.  Their  kinds  are  many,  as 
Cyphars  simple;  Cyphars  intermixt  with  Nulloes,  or  non-significant 
Characters;  Cyphers  of  double  Letters  under  one  Character; 
Wheele- Cyphars;  Kay-Cyphars;  Cyphars  of  words  {Ih.  p.  264.) 

The  reader  will  see  these  two  pages  carry  the  same  numbers  as 
the  first  words  of  the  line. 

Hang  Hog  is  Latin  for  Bacon  I  warrant  you. 

That  is,  Hang  Hog  are  263,  264  counted  down  page  53,  Merry 
Wives  of  Windsor  (see  reproduced  page).     Col.  106. 

Let  the  reader  count  the  words  down  page  264  from  the  top,  and 
he  will  find  the  words,  Deficients  theeein,  the  52d  and  53d,  to 
tell  us  that  the  poetry,  which  "  is  so  atnplg  spread,  and,  as  it  were,  a 
superfluous  labor,  to  be  curious  of  any  Deficients  therein,"  refers 
to  the  Shakespeare  Theater,  indicated  by  Shakespeare's  life,  52,  and 
his  53d  year  (Stratford  monument).  The  critic  will  most  likely 
question  my  figures  and  my  printed  matter.  Let  him  ask  Mr. 
Schulte,  of  298  Dearborn  street,  Chicago,  if  his  copy  of  the  said 
work,  declares  my  figures  and  printed  matter  correct,  or  no?  I  will 
lay  one  thousand  pounds  I  am  right,  provided  the  words  every  tvhere 
are  counted  (as  they  are  printed)  as  two  words.  Even  if  they  are 
counted  singly  (which  they  cannot  legitimately  be,  as  they  are  not 
hyphenated),  the  word  '^  therein,^'  is  the  fifty-second  word.  Every 
page  of  this  extraordinary  book  reveals  these  cipher  hints,  and  I, 
who  have  made  tables  of  the  pages  for  the  last  three  years,  must  be 
pardoned  smiling  when  I  hear  people  doubting  Bacon's  authorship 
of  the  plays.  It  is  like  hearing  the  existence  of  the  sun  questioned, 
and  I  cannot  allow  it  is  any  more  a  questionable  theory,  or  open  to 
doubt  than  the  Greek  language,  except  on  the  score  of  ignorance  or 
of  those  not  in  possession  of  the  facts. 

It  may  be  also  noted  the  words  "  every  where, '^  are  the  34th  and 
35th  in  order  down  page  264.    This  is  to  tell  us,  *'  the  Poesy 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  151 

WHICH  KUNS  ALONG  EVERYWHERE,'^  is  the  1623  foliO;  Sliakespeare 
indicated  by  tlie  number  35. 

With  regard  to  Bacon's  quotation  from  Martial: 

Coenae  Fercula  Nostras 
Mallem  Convivis  quam  placuisse  Cocis 

it  may  be  interesting  to  note,  Ben  Jonson  in  his  masque  of  Nep- 
tune's Triumph;  (1624),  introduces  a  humorous  dialogue  between  a 
poet  and  a  master  cook,  in  which  their  arts  are  compared  and  criti- 
cised respectively  to  each  other. 

Poet.  You  are  not  his  majesty's  confectioner,  are  you  ? 

Cook.  No,  but  one  that  has  as  good  title  to  the  room, — his  Master 
Cook.    What  are  you,  sir  ? 

Poet.  The  most  unprofitable  of  his  servants,  I,  sir,  the  Poet.  A 
kind  of  a  Christmas  surprise,  — one  that  is  used  at  least  once  a  year 
for  a  trifling  instrument  of  wit  or  so. 

Cook.  Were  you  ever  a  cook  ? 

Poet.  A  cook !    No,  surely. 

Cook.  Then  you  can  be  no  good  poet;  for  a  good  poet  differs 
nothing  at  all  from  a  Master  Cook,  either  arts  is  the  wisdom  of  the 
mind. 

Poet.  As  how,  sir  ? 

Cook.  Expect,  I  am  by  my  place,  to  know  how  to  please  the 
palates  of  the  guests,  so  you  are  to  know  the  palate  of  the  times, 
study  the  several  tastes,  what  every  nation,  the  Spaniard,  the  Dutch, 
the  French,  the  Walloon,  the  Neapolitan,  the  Britain,  the  Sicilian, 
can  expect  from  you. 

Poet.  That  were  a  heavy,  and  a  hard  task  to  satisfy  expectation, 
who  is  so  severe  an  exac tress  of  duties,  ever  a  tyrannous  mistress, 
and  most  times  a  pressing  enemy. 

Cook.  She  is  a  powerful  Greek  lady  at  all  times,  and  must  be 
satisfied.  So  must  her  sister,  Madame  Curiosity,  who  hath  as 
dainty  a  palate  as ,  and  these  will  expect. 

Poet.  But,  what  if  they  expect  more  than  they  understand  ? 

Cook.  That's  all  one,  Mr.  Poet,  you  are  bound  to  satisfy  the^l. 
For,  there  is  a  palate  of  the  Understanding  as  well  as  of  the  senses. 
The  Taste  is  taken  with  good  relishes,  the  Sight  with  fair  objects, 
the  Hearing  with  delicate  sounds,  the  Smelling  with  pure  scents, 
the  Feeling  with  soft  and  plump  bodies,  but  the  Understanding  with 
all  these :  for  all  which  you  must  begin  at  the  kitchen.  There,  the 
Art  of  Poetry  was  learned,  and  found  out,  or  nowhere,  and  the  same 
day  with  the  Art  of  Cookery. 

Poet.  I  should  have  given  it  rather  to  the  cellar,  if  my  sufirage 
had  been  asked. 

Cook.  0,  you  are  the  Oracle  of  the  Bottle,  I  see.  Hogshead 
Trismegestus.    He  is  your  Pegasus.    Thence  flows  the  spring  of 
your  Muses  from  that  hoofe. 
Seduced  Poet,  I  do  say  to  thee, 
A  boiler,  ranger,  dresser  were  the  fountains 


152  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEEATUME. 

Of  all  the  knowledge  in  the  universe, 

And  that's  the  kitchen. 

A  Master  Cook !  why,  he  is  the  man  of  men, 

For  a  professor !    He  designs,  he  draws, 

He  paints,  he  carves,  he  builds,  he  fortifies, 

Makes  citadels  of  curious  fowl  or  fish. 

He  has  Natui'e  in  a  pot !  'hove  all  the  chemists, 

Or  hare-breech'd  brethren  of  the  Rosie  Crosse. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  in  the  first  part  of  King  Henry  the 
Fourth,  this: 

Poins.  Where  hast  been  Hall  ? 

Prince.  With  three  or  four  loggerheads,  amongst  three  or  four 
score  Hogsheads.    (Act  iv,  4.) 

This  last  word  was  evidently  a  nickname  given  to  those 
who  frequented  the  Boarsheacl  Tavern  in  Eastcheape,  the  Prince 
exclaiming  in  direct  context  with  the  above : 

When  I  am  King  of  England  I  shall  command 
All  the  good  lads  in  Eastcheape.  {lb.) 

There  is  no  question  some  of  Rabelais'  works  and  language 
are  covers  for  secret  cipher.  The  broad  language  he  introduces 
into  his  writings  conceals  a  profound  purport  of  cryptic  language, 
which  was  probably  understood  alone  by  the  initiated  brotherhood 
of  which  he  was  a  member.  I  therefore  desire  to  point  out  how 
Bacon  opens  his  sixth  book  of  tlie  De  Augmentis  (containing  secret 
cipher  and  embracing  Tradition,  or  the  Delivery  of  Secret  or  Cryptic 
Knowledge),  with  an  allusion  to  certain  works  of  Rabelais  by  par- 
allel. The  reader  will,  moreover,  perceive  there  is  aflQliation  of 
some  sort,  purely  Masonic,  suggested  by  the  Utopian  literature  of 
Rabelais,  Sir  Thomas  More  and  Bacon.  They  are  each  and  all  ideal- 
ist reformers,  and,  therefore,  men  of  advanced  views,  whose  opin- 
ions, openly  expressed,  would  have  been  impossible  in  their  ages, 
and  their  refuge  had  to  be  cryptic,  their  meetings  probably  held  in 
vaults,  their  writings  cipher  jargon  (like  some  of  Rabelais'  works)  or 
acroamatical.  The  reader  may  perceive,  from  the  passage  about  to 
be  cited  from  the  opening  of  Bacon's  sixth  book  of  the  Advance- 
ment of  Learning,  1040  (translation  of  the  De  Augmentis,  1623), 
how  Bacon  hints  at  concealment  or  cryptic  (underground)  storage 
of  "  new  harvests  of  knowledge:" 

"  It  is  permitted  to  every  man  (excellent  king)  to  make  merrv 
with  himself  and  his  own  matters.  Who  knows,  then,  but  this  work 
of  mine  is  copied  from  a  certain  old  book  found  in  the  most  famous 
library  of  St.  Victor,  of  which  Master  Francis  Rabelais  made  a  cata- 
logue?   For  there  is  a  book  there  entitled  The  Ant-hill  of  Arts. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  153 

And  certainly  I  have  raised  up  here  a  little  heap  of  dust,  and  stored 
under  it  a  great  many  grains  of  sciences  and  arts,  into  which  the 
ants  may  creep  and  rest  for  awhile,  and  then  prepare  themselves  for 
fresh  labors.  Now,  the  wisest  of  kings  refers  sluggards  to  the  ants, 
and,  for  my  part,  I  hold  all  men  for  sluggards  who  care  only  to  use 
what  they  have  got,  without  preparing  for  new  seedtimes  and  new 
harvests  of  knowledge."    (Book  vi.  Dc  Augmentis.) 

It  is  worthy  of  note  that  Rabelais'  Ahhey  of  Thelema  is  a  Utopian 
dream,  holding  much  in  common  with  Bacon's  New  Atlantis,  and 
the  Rosicrucian  commonwealths  of  John  Val  Andreas.  McKenzie 
(in  his  Boyal  Masonic  Cyclopcedia)  writes  of  Rabelais : 

"  The  Gargantua  and  Pantagruel  of  Rabelais,  probably  the  pro- 
foundest  Masonic  problem  yet  to  be  unriddled."    (p.  614.) 

Again  (under  his  name): 

"  Many  of  his  notions  were  purely  Masonic,  but  whether  he 
knew  anything  of  Masonry,  it  is  difiBcult  to  say.  Many  passages, 
however,  prove  that  he  was  acquainted  with  the  Hermetic  branch 
of  the  subject.  The  description  of  the  Abbey  of  Thelema,  where 
every  one  was  to  do  just  as  he  pleased,  together  with  its  govern- 
ment, may  take  its  place  beside  More's  Utopia,  Plato's  Bepublic, 
and  Bacon's  Atlantis.  Rabelais  is  a' forbidden  book  to  many,  on 
nccount  of  its  containing  much  that  a  thin-skinned  modern  century 
does  not  like  to  see  expressed  in  writing,  but  has  no  scruple,  as 
daily  experience  shows,  to  put  in  practice." 

Bacon's  New  Atlantis  was  evidently  an  imitation  of  Sir  Thomas 
More's  Utopia.  These  sort  of  works  bespeak  for  themselves  not 
only  advanced  views,  but,  in  consequence,  carry  esoteric  or  acroa- 
matical  writing.  The  one  involves  the  other,  inasmuch  as  any 
Utopian  or  ideal  visions  of  regeneration  of  society  (in  the  ages  these 
works  were  written),  necessarily  carried  with  them  danger  to  the 
author  and  impossibility  of  open  writing.  The  Abbey  of  Thelema,  by 
Rabelais,  belongs  to  this  class  of  literature,  of  which  the  earliest 
prototype  is  Plato's  New  Bepublic.  Now,  it  is  very  curious  to  find 
a  sort  of  brotherhood  connecting  Rabelais  to  More,  who,  in  his 
second  book  of  Pantagruel,  introduces  Sir  Thomas  More,  under  the 
title  of  Thaumast.  In  chapter  xviii.  we  find  •'  How  a  great  scholar 
of  England  would  have  argued  against  Pantagruel,  and  was  over- 
come by  Panurge."  In  chapter  xix.:  "  How  Panurge  put  to  a  non- 
plus the  Englishman  that  argued  by  signs. '^  In  chapter  xx.:  "  How 
Thaumast  relat^th  the  virtues  and  knowledge  of  Panurge." 

Bacon,  under  the  title  of  Belations  (that  is,  of  the  historical  rela- 
tions of  men  to  each  other),  discourses  of  the  records  of  the  past,  of 
Lives,  Times  and  Chronicles,  which  is  a  subject  touching  himself 


154  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

and  his  relations  to  Shakespeare.  He  divides  Perfect  History  into 
Chronicles  of  Times,  Lives  of  Persons,  Relations  of  Acts  and  their 
explications.    That  all  this  relates  to  himself  is  most  unquestionable. 

"  $  J.5  concerning  Relations,  it  could  be,  in  truth,  wish't  that  there 
were  a  greater  diligence  taken  therein,  for  there  is  no  action  more 
eminent  that  hath  not  some  able  pen  to  attend  it,  which  may  take 
and  transcribe  it.  And  because  it  is  a  quality  not  common  to  all 
men  to  write  a  perfect  Jiistory  to  the  life  and  dignity  thereof  (as  may 
well  appear  by  the  small  number  even  of  mean  writers  in  that 
kind);  yet,  if  particular  actions  were  but  by  a  tolerable  pen 
reported  as  they  pass,  it  might  be  hoped  that  in  some  after  age 
writers  might  arise  that  might  compile  a  perfect  liistory  by  the  help 
and  assistance  of  such  notes,  for  such  collections  might  be  as  a 
nursery  garden  whereby  to  plant  a  fair  and  stately  garden  when 
time  should  serve." 

What  stately  garden  is  this  that  Bacon  refers  to  ?  The  answer 
must  be  given  in  his  own  words : 

"  The  gardens  of  the  Muses  keep  the  privilege  of  the  golden 
age ;  they  even  flourish  and  are  in  league  with  Time.  The  monu- 
ments oftvit  survive  the  monuments  of  power;  the  verses  of  a  poet 
endure  without  a  syllable  lost,  while  states  and  empires  pass  many 
periods.  Let  him  not  think  he  shall  descend,  for  he  is  now  upon  a 
hill  as  a  ship  is  mounted  on  the  ridge  of  a  wave ;  but  that  hill  of  the 
Muses  is  above  tempests,  always  clear  and  calm,  a  hill  of  the  good- 
liest discovery  that  man  can  have,  being  a  prospect  upon  all  the 
errors  of  wanderings  of  the  present  and  former  times. " 


CHAPTER  VIII. 
Bacon's  Title  Page  Engravings. 

"  On  a  soil  that  has  hitherto  been  unoccupied,  and  with  instruments  that  have 
never  jet  been  used,  he  will  build  altogether  anew.  The  instrument  that  he  em- 
ploys is  the  N<rvum  Organum;  the  ground-plan,  according  to  which  he  proceeds,  is 
composed  of  the  books  De  Dignitate  et  Augmentis  Scientiarum,  which  form,  as  it 
were,  the  new  map  of  the  Globus  Intellectnalis;  the  whole  edifice  itself  he  calls 
the  Instauratio  Magna^  (Kuno  Fischer,  Francis  Bacon  of  Verulam,  214.) 

In  Bacon's  chief  works  is  to  be  found  a  title-page  engraving, 
the  chief  features  of  which  are  the  two  Masonic  columns  or  pillar Sj 
which  sufficiently  prove  Bacon's  Masonic  afifihations.  These  two 
columns  may  be  refound  upon  the  title-page  engraving  of  the  first 
edition  Novupi  Organum  (1620),  Sylva  Sylvarum  (1626-1627),  and 
the  engraving  given  in  this  work  is  a  reproduction  of  the  title- 
page  engraving  of  the  1640  translation  of  the  Advancement  of 
Learning^  published  at  Oxford,  under  the  supervision  of  the  two 
Universities,  which  work  is  included  by  Bacon's  chaplain.  Doctor 
Rawley,  in  the  list  of  his  lordship's  true  works  {Besuscitatio,  1657, 
1671).  As  this  subject  is  interesting,  and  evidently  the  design  of 
the  frontispiece  is  symbolical,  I  offer  here  a  few  theories  which,  I 
believe,  will  ultimately  be  found' to  be  not  far  from  the  truth. 

GOLDEN  PILLARS. 

<'  Hiram,  King  of  Tyre,  according  toMenander,  dedicated  a  pillar 
of  gold  to  Jupiter  J  on  the  grand  junction  he  had  formed  between 
Eurichorus  and  Tyre  "  (los-con-Apion).  In  the  Temple  of  Jupiter 
Triphylius,  in  the  fabulous  island  of  Panchaia,  there  was  a  golden 
bed  of  Jupiter  six  cubits  in  length  and  four  in  breadth,  upon  which 
there  stood  a  golden  column,  and  a  chronicle  of  the  actions  of 
Uranus,  Saturn  and  Jove  was  inscribed  upon  the  column  in  Pancha- 
ian  letters,  or,  as  Diodorus  says  in  another  passage,  in  the  sacred 
Egyptian  letters. 

0,  rejoice 
Beyonci  a  common  joy,  and  set  it  down. 
With  gold  on  lasting  pillars :  In  one  voyage 
Did  Claribel  lier  husband  find  at  Tunis, 
And  Ferdinand,  her  brother,  found  a  wife 
Where  he  himself  was  lost.        {Tempest,  Act  v.,  1.) 

155 


156  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

THE   TWO  PILLARS  OF  SOLOMON. 

"  Pillars  or  obelisks  were  often  used  to  commemorate  remarkable 
events  iu  the  private  annals  of  nations.  The  wisdom  of  Solomon, 
therefore,  induced  him  to  construct  a  pair  of  commemorative  pillars, 
and  to  place  them  at  the  entrance  of  the  porch,  for  a  leason  which 
will  shortly  appear.  He  called  their  names  Jachiu  and  Boaz,  which 
signified  strength  and  erection,  and  their  union  stability.  The  right 
hand  pillar  was  named  after  Jachin,  the  son  of  Simeon,  and  that  on 
the  left  from  Boaz,  the  great  grandfather  of  David.  Our  traditions 
say  that  Hiram  gave  a  name  to  one  pillar  and  Solomon  to  the  other. 
Boa:3  referred  to  the  Sun,  because  he  rejoiceth  as  a  strong  man  to 
run  his  course ;  and  Jachin  to  the  Moon,  because  it  was  predicted  of 
Solomon  that  in  his  kingdom,  peace  and  righteousness  should  flour- 
ish so  long  as  the  Sun  and  Moon  endure."  (Lect.  ix.,  p.  219,  The 
Theocratic  Philosophy  of  Freemasonry,  by  Oliver). 

The  two  pillars  appear  on  the  title  pages  of  both  the  Sylva  Syl- 
varum  and  Novum  Organum.  In  the  Sylva  Sylvarum  there  is  the 
creative  motto  from  Genesis: 

Et  vidit  Deus  lucem  quod  esset  bona. 

"The  Phoenicians  and  Hebrews  had  two  pillars,  the  embodi- 
ments of  the  two  hostile  powers,  and  Movers  declares  they  were  re- 
garded as  the  greatest  Gods  of  thePha3nicians  "  {Movers,  394.)  "  The 
Phcenicians  called  the  pillars  of  Hercules,  Uso  and  Hypsuranius, 
and  celebrated  great  festivals  in  honor  of  these  pillar  gods.  They 
were  the  Darkness  and  the  Light. "  {Dunlap's  Spirit  History  of  Man, 
p.  301.)  (See  Movers,  294,  295,  also  Sanchoniathon,  in  Movers,  344.) 
"The  shadow  that  fell  from  the  top  of  the  sun  pillar  upon  the  sun's  boat 
and  always  accompanies  the  sun  upon  its  annual  course,  is  Typhon. 
Sol  becomes  Typhon."  {Movers,  300.)  "  Zoroaster  taught  that 
from  the  beginning  the  principles  of  things  were  two,  one  the  Father, 
the  other  the  Mother;  the  former  is  Light,  the  latter  Darkness" 
{Munter  Bab.,  p.  46.)  "  The  Chald^ean  Zaratas  taught  Pythagoras 
that  there  were  two  original  causes  of  all  things,  called  the  Father 
and  the  Mother.  The  father  is  Light,  the  Mother  Darkness  (Movers 
265,  Origenis  Philosophumena,  p.  38.  Dunlap^s  Spirit  History, 
306.) 

The  title  page  of  the  Sylva  Sylvarum  (in  which  work  the 
New  Atlantis  is  included)  contains  a  globe,  entitled  the  Intellect- 
ual World,  resting  (between  two  pillars)  upon  the  waters.  Stud- 
(  nts  of  Bacon  need  not  be  reminded,  that  his  simile  is  that  of  circum- 
navigating (in  the  ship  of  his  Advancement  of  Learning)  the  entire 
navigable  globe.  The  piece  entitled  a  Description  of  the  Intellectual 
Globe  is,  as  Spedding  states,  a  further  draft  or  sketch  of  the 
Advancement  of  Learning,  abandoned  in  favor  of  the  1623  De  Aug- 
mentis. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE.  157 

At  the  end  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning  (1G05)  Bacon  writes : 

"  Thus  have  I  made,  as  it  were,  a  small  globe  of  the  intellectual 
world,  as  truly  and  faithfully  as  I  could  discover."  {Aldis  and 
Wright,  p.  2C8).  Again :  "  In  substance,  because  it  is  the  perfect 
law  of  inquiry  of  truth,  that  nothing  be  in  the  globe  of  matter,  which 
should  not  be  likewise  in  the  globe  of  crystal  or  form;  that  is,  that 
there  be  not  anything  in  being  and  action,  which  should  not  be 
drawn  and  collected  into  contemplation  and  doctrine. " 

Doctor  Thompson,  of  Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  has  pointed 
out  that  the  origin  of  Bacon's  "  globe  of  matter,^''  and  "  globe  of  crys- 
tal or  form, "  is  probably  the  dcpaipo?  aidOT^roi,  and  the  dcpaipoi 
vor/ro?  of  Empedocles,  as  interpreted  by  Proclus.  (See  Proclus  in 
Timceum,  160,  D.  and  Simplicius  in  Physica,  p.  7,  b.)  In  that 
mysterious  work,  Chester's  Lovers  Martyr,  in  which  Shakespeare's 
poem  of  the  Phoenix  and  Turtle  was  first  published,  is  the  following 
verse  by  Ben  Jonson  in  praise  of  the  Pha3nis  and  Turtle  : 

Judgment  (adoi-n'd  with  learning) 

Doth  shine  in  her  discerning, 

Clear  as  a  naketl  vestal 

Closed  in  an  orb  of  crystal.— 5ew  Jonson. 

"  In  the  beginning, "  saith  the  first  book  of  Moses,  "  Elohim 
made  the  essence  of  the  earth  and  the  essence  of  the  two  heavens. 
There  were  two  heavens,  the  Invisible  and  Spiritual,  which  the 
eye  hath  never  seen,  and  tvhich  the  heart  of  a  man  cannot  conceive  ; 
and  the  Visible,  consisting  of  the  planetary  spheres,  the  empyreum,  or 
elastic  firmament,  and  the  day  or  Crystaline  Sphere,  where  the  waters 
above  the  firmament,  and  beyond  the  solar  heat,  are  suspended  in 
radiant  globes.     {Babel  Nimrod,  vol.  i.,  p.  184.) 

2(paifDoi  at6Qrjr6<;  means  the  sensible  globe  (or  world),  just  as 
6cpaLf)o<;  vorjTr)^  means  the  intelligible,  or  intellectual  globe. 
In  fact.  Bacon's  statement  amounts  to  what  he  elsewhere  states, 
''  That  the  truth  of  being  and  the  truth  of  knowing  are  all  one." 
Now,  on  the  frontispiece,  facing  Bacon's  portrait,  in  all  the  editions 
of  the  Sylva  Sylvarum,  there  is  a  globe  resting  (between  two  pil- 
lars) upon  the  sea,  and  on  it  is  written  Mundus  Intellectualis.  It  is 
faintly  mapped  out  with  dotted  lines,  as  if  invisible  or  undiscovered. 
On  the  title-page  design  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640., 
given,  we  find  two  globes,  or  worlds,  facing  each  other;  one  mapped 
out,  the  other  dotted,  and  respectively  entitled  Mundus  Visibilis 
and  Mundus  Intellectualis,  with  sun  and  moon  beneath.  From  each 
globe  or  hemisphere  an  arm  is  stretched,  with  clasped  hands  in  the 
center,  with  the  motto,  ratione  et  experiantia  foederantur^  which 


158  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

explains  itself.     These  two  globes  are  as  Matter  to  Mind,  as  the  Sen- 
sible to  the  Intellectual,  as  the  Visible  to  the  Invisible. 
Bacon  writes : 

"  And  therefore  it  was  most  aptly  said  by  one  of  Plato's  school, 
that  the  5ew5e  of  man  carrieth  a  resemblance  with  the  sun,  which 
(as  we  see)  openeth  and  revealeth  all  the  terrestrial  globe;  but  then 
ag'ain  it  obscure th  and  concealeth  the  stars  and  celestial  globe:  so 
doth  the  sense  discover  natural  things,  but  it  darkneth  and  shut- 
teth  up  divine. "  (P.  9,  Book  1,  Advancement  of  Learning.  Aldis 
and  Wright.) 

No  small  part  of  the  entire  Baconian  philosophy  is  contained  in 
these  passages.  In  the  engraving  to  the  Advancement  of  Learning, 
already  mentioned,  there  is  the  Sun,  placed  underneath  the  Visible 
Globe,  and  the  Moon  under  the  Invisible  or  Intellectual  World.  As 
the  stars  are  to  be  only  seen  by  night,  so  the  Moon  is  the  emblem  of 
the  reflection  of  things  invisible. 

Under  the  description  of  the  first  part  of  the  Great  Instauration 
in  his  preface  (or  distribution  of  the  work  into  six  parts).  Bacon 
writes  (page  22,  Advancement,  1640) : 

"  For  there  are  found  in  the  Intellectual  Globe,  as  in  the  terres- 
trial, soils  improved  and  deserts.  Wherefore  let  it  not  seem  strange 
if  now  and  then  we  make  a  departure  from  the  usual  divisions,  and 
forsake  the  beaten  path  of  some  partitions :  for  addition,  whilst  it 
varies  the  whole,  of  necessity  varies  the  parts  and  the  sections 
thereof;  and  the  accepted  divisions  are  accommodated  only  to  the 
accepted  sum  of  sciences,  as  it  is  now  cast  up." 

This  passage  plainly  tells  us  (applying  as  it  does  to  the  first  part. 
Partitions  of  the  Sciences,  of  the  Instauration)  that  The  Advance- 
ment of  Learning,  (that  is,  the  work  entitled  Be  Augmentis  of  1623 
and  1640),  is  the  Intellectual  Globe,  or  Mundus  Intellectualis,  which 
we  perceive  upon  the  engraved  title-page  by  Marshall  of  the  1640 
supposed  translation  by  Gilbert  Watts.  A  very  great  deal  may  be 
gathered  from  this  engraving,  inasmuch  as  this  globe  of  the  intel- 
lectual world  is  a  species  of  new  world  only  faintly  dotted  out,  sug- 
gesting discoveries,  which  fully  falls  in  with  Bacon's  words,  "  For 
there  are  found  in  the  intellectual  globe,  as  in  the  terrestrial,  soils 
improved  and  desert,"  —  meaning  that  this  work,  like  a  new  hemi- 
sphere, has  to  be  explored,  its  deserts  mapped  out,  and  discovered. 
This  throws  a  light  upon  Bacon's  ship  device,  inasmuch  as  this  voy- 
age of  intellectual  discovery,  between  the  visible  world  and  the  invisi- 
ble, suggests  a  voyage  of  discovery  to  the  New  World  of  Sciences  of 
the  Deficients. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE.  159 

Now,  the  striking  part  of  this  frontispiece  is,  that  if  the  reader 
will  run  his  eye  from  the  visible  world  down  to  the  base  of  the  coir 
umn  inscribed  Oxford,  he  will  find  poesy  and  Bacon's  completed 
portion  of  the  Instauration  under  the  base.  In  like  manner  we 
see  the  other  half  of  Bacon^s  uncompleted,  or  the  three  missing  por- 
tions of  the  Great  Instauration,  under  the  intellectual  or  invisible 
globe,  which  is  joining  hands  with  the  visible.  In  all  this  there  is  a 
distinct  meaning,  for  how  is  it  (as  any  one  can  plainly  see),  half 
Bacon's  Instauration  under  Oxford,  is  shaking  hands  with  the  other 
half  (which  we  do  not  possess)  under  Cambridge?  And,  as  if  to 
complete  and  point  out  the  connection,  the  title  of  this  Advance- 
ment hangs  on  a  curtain,  (from  a  line  connected  between  the  tops  of 
the  plinths  of  the  two  colleges),  as  if  to  again  suggest,  that  the  grasp- 
ing of  hands,  or  marriage  of  the  visible  to  the  invisible  world  of 
intellect,  can  only  be  bridged  over  and  effected  by  the  Advancement 
of  Learning. 

It  maybe  objected,  that  all  this  is  only  emblematic  of  the  two 
universities,  and  their  respective  characteristics ;  namely,  that  as 
Cambridge  has  always  been  associated  with  mathematical  or  in- 
ductive science,  so  Oxford  is  representative  of  the  classical  or 
literary  element.  True,  but  how  is  it  Bacon's  six  divisions  of  his 
Great  Instauration  are  found  divided  between  the  two  universities 
one  half  being  with  Oxford,  the  other  half  with  Cambridge  ?  It  is 
curious  to  perceive  the  missing  last  three  divisions  of  the  Instaura- 
tion associated  with  Cambridge,  with  the  invisible  or  intellectual 
globe  above  them,  as  much  as  to  suggest,  that  the  Scala  Intellectus 
the  Prodromi,  and  the  second  philosophy,  emergent  upon  practice, 
are  associated  with  mathematics  or  numbers,  and  hold  out  their 
hands  to  the  other  three  completed  parts  (across  the  sea),  in  the  vis- 
ible or  poetic  world  of  the  plays !  These  two  plinths,  representative 
of  the  two  realms  of  induction  and  deduction,  of  the  real  and  visible, 
and  of  the  intellectual  or  invisible,  are  plainly  a  reproduction  of  the  two 
pillars  of  Hercules,  of  the  two  columns  of  the  Masons,  that  are  to  be 
refound  in  both  the  engravings  attached  to  the  1620  Novum  Organum 
and  the  Si/lva  Sylvarum.  They  represent  two  distinct  worlds,  sep- 
arated as  an  old  world  from  a  new  world,  and  Bacon's  ship  is  noth- 
ing but  his  method  bridging  and  crossing  the  seas  which  sep- 
arate them.  That  ship,  we  believe,  is  associated  with  the  Advance- 
ment of  Learning  m  nine  books,  and  that  is  why  the  title  is  displayed 
upon  a  banner  hanging  from  a  line  stretched  from  university  to 
university.    There  is  a  complete  understanding  in  this  engraving, 


160     ,  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE, 

for  the  joined  hands,  the  connected  title  on  its  cord,  the  ship  cross- 
ing the  seas,  from  world  to  world,  are  all  in  perfect  harmony  with 
each  other. 

As  Bacon's  intellectual  globe  answers  or  corresponds  to  his  invisi- 
ble world,  pictured  upon  the  frontispiece  given  (facing  the  portrait 
of  himself  in  the  1640  Oxford  edition),  something  may  be  gathered 
by  a  closer  study  o^his  Description  of  the  Intellectual  Globe,  a  tract 
published  in  1612. 

The  first  thing  that  strikes  us  as  curious  in  commencing  the 
treatise  entitled  the  Description  of  the  Intellectual  Globe,  is  to  find 
it  opening  with  the  division  of  all  human  learning  into  history, 
poesy,  and  philosophy,  as  we  find  in  the  second  book  of  the 
Advancement  af  Learning,  1605  (p.  85,  Aldis  &  Wright),  and  the 
first  chapter  of  the  second  book  De  Augmentis.  But  we  must 
be  careful  to  note  a  most  important  fact,  and  that  is,  that  while 
(for  some  chapters)  following  the  argument  and  subject  mat- 
ter of  both  the  (1005)  Advancement  and  De  Augmentis,  it  differs 
from  both  as  to  text.     Spedding  writes  : 

"  This  tract,  published  by  Glruter  in  1653,  mnst  have  been  written 
about  1612.  This  follows,  from  what  has  been  said  of  the  new  star 
in  Cygnus,  which  was  first  observed  in  1600.  It  is  therefore  inter- 
mediate in  date  between  the  Advancement  of  Learning  and  the 
De  Augmentis,  and,  though  on  a  larger  scale  than  either,  it  is  to  he 
referred  to  the  same  division  of  Bacon's  writings.  The  design  of  all 
these  is  the  same,  namely,  a  survey  of  the  existing  state  of 
knowledge.  The  commendation  of  learning  which  forms  the  first 
book  of  the  other  two  works  being  in  this  one  omitted,  it  com- 
mences with  the  tripartite  division  of  knowledge,  which  Bacon 
founded  on  the  corresponding  division  of  the  faculties  of  man — 
memory,  imagination  and  reason.  History,  which  corresponds  to 
memory,  is  here  as  in  the  De  Augmentis,  primarily  divided  into  nat- 
ural and  civil,  whereas  in  the  Advancement  the  primary  division 
of  history  is  quadripartite,  literary  and  ecclesiastical  history 
being  made  co-ordinate  with  civil  history,  instead  of  being,  as  here, 
subordinated  to  it. " 

It  is  therefore  perfectly  clear,  Bacon  at  one  time  contemplated 
calling  his  De  Augmentis  by  the  name  of  the  Intellectual  Globe,  and 
though  he  ultimately  abandoned  this  title  for  the  former,  it  is  equally 
certain,  the  De  Augmentis  (and  its  translation  of  1640)  answered, 
in  Bacon's  mind,  to  the  idea  embraced  under  the  early  title  and 
draft  of  1612,  that  is  the  Intellectual  Globe. 


roz  T^ifGOtferies* 


"  ~  .  3ffe«Stions  more  in  his  power.    The  fearc  of  every  man  that  heard  him, 
was,  left  hcefliouid  make  an  end. 
ScrlptorHm      Ctcerfih  laid  t(> bee  the  only  wit  j  Jthat  the  people  of  Rome  had  cquall'd 
cJd(ygui .  to  their  Bmptt'Ci.    Ingeniam  far  imperh.     We  havchad  many,  and  in  their 
Sir  Thoma4  feyeral  I  Ages,  ^to  take  in  but  the  former  Seculum,  >  Sir  Thomas  Moon ,  the 
Mwre*       e}qcr  WtAt^  Hmrf  ,  Eatle  of  Surref-^  Chalmr ,  Smithy  ClioP,  B .  Gardiner, 
faxThomi^  were  for.  theu' times  ad  riiiriiblc:  and  the  more,  becaufe  they  began  EIo* 
^^^'  V      ^^^'^^  with  «S.    S'liMca:  Bacony  wds  fingular,  and  almoft  alone ,  in  the 
jien:  Earie  j^^g  j^ning  of  Qiieene  ElizAbeths  times.  Sir  PhilipSidney,  and  Mr.  Hooker 
%ii^b?^M  Ci<?<iiffercnt  mjacter)  grciv  great  Matters  of  wit,  and  language^  and  in 
Chftloner,    whomall  vigour  of  Invention ,  and  ftrength  of  judgement  met.     The 
SvcThinds  Earleof  £^jr,  noble  and  high-,  and  Sir  IValter  Ratvlei^h ,  not  to  be  con* 
^mithi        temn'd^  citlier  for  j udgeraent,  or  ftile.   Sir  Henry  Savile  grave jand  truly 
Sir  Thsmoi  ktter'dj  Sir  Edwin Sandes,  excellent  in  both;  Lo:Egerton,  theChan- 
Cliot.         celior,  a  grave  y  and  great  Orator  •,  and  beft ,  When  hce  was  proVok'd. 
B.CaKdi-f    But  his  learned,  and  able  ('though  unfortunate)  5«fr^j(/ir)  is  he,  who  hath 
Sr *iV:V-      ^^^'^  MP  ^^^  numbers »  and  perforni'd  that  in  our  tongue  ,  which  may  be 
£ac0H.LX.  f  ompar'd,  or  preferred  ,  either  to  inlolcnt  Greece ,  or  haughty  Rome,    In 
Sir  Huip    flipr^;,  within  liis  view,  and  about  his  times,  were  all  the  wit's  borne,  that 
Sydney.       cpuld'honour  a  language,  or  helpe  ftudy.  Now  things  daily  fall:  wits 
yii.Rkh^d  grow  downe^ ward, and  £/^^//<r»r(r  growes  back- ward  ;  S6 that  hee  may 
jjoaker.      ijq  nam'd,  and  ftand  as  the  marke^  and  aKM«  of  our  language. 
jiolf.EarJe       i  have  eyerObfcrv'dxt^  to  have  becnc  the  office  of  a  wife  Patriot,  a- 
*'f  ^^^^'    mong  tlie  gr^ateftaffaires  of  the  State^  to  take  care  of  the  C&mmoff-malfh 
Rdlekh'^   ofj^earning.    Fpr  Schooles,  they  are  the -Sfw/Tz^r/Vj  of  State:  and  no- 
Sir  Henry   thing  is  worthief  the  ifudy  of  a  Statef-man ,  the  n  that  part  of  the  Reptib' 
S4v[le.  Sir  liche^  which  wee  call  the  advancement  of  Letters,     WitnefTe  the  care  of 
Edw'm        ItdifuC/tfar-y  whointhejieatof  theciviU  warrc,writ  hisbookesof  y^/t;^ 
Sanis.SXt  logic ^  and  dedicated  them  toT*//;.  This  made  the  late  Lord  S.  Albane, 
Thomoi:      entitle  his  worke ,  npimm  Orgamm.     Which  though  by  the  moft  of  fu- 
Egerton.     perficiall  men  ^  who  cannot  get  beyond  the  Title  of  Homtmls ,  it  is  not 
\'t^F    cts  penetrated^. nor underflpod;  it  really  openeth  all defeds of  Learning, 
^AcoC"  whatfocvex  5  and  is  a  Bookei 
L.C.  * 

T>e  Aug-  O  m  longum  notofcripionporHget  jivum^ 

mentisjci- 

emi*rttm.        j^ly  conccit  of  his  Perfon  was  never  increafed  toward  him ,  by  his 
jultHs  C<e-  pjgj-^  ^  Qj.  honours.     But  I  have ,  and  doe  reverence  him  for  the  great- 
Lord  S  Al'  ^^^'^*  ^^^^  "^^  onely  proptr  to  him felfe,  in  thathee  feem'd  to  mee  e  ver, 
^ane    "    '  ^V  ^^^  worke  one  of  the  greateft  men ,  and  moft  worthy  of  admiration, 
Hwat'.dt    that  bad  beene  in  many  Ages*  In  his  adv^rfity  lever  prayed,  thatG^^ 
0Xti?oeuca.  wCJiDld  giyc.  felm  ftrength :  -for  Gre&tne(fe  hee  could  not  want.    Neither 
Decorrnp-  coald  I  condolc~in  aword ,  of  fyllabfc  for  him  ^  as  kn6wing  no  Acci- 
teU  m(frnT».  deiitEOulddoe  hiiime  to  t^.cttue  $  but  rather  helpe  to  aiake  it  manifeft . 
Th^re  cannot  ht  onecoldur  of  the  mind  %  an  other  of  the  wit.  If  the 
mind  beiiaitl,gravCi  and  composed  5  the  wit  is  fo,  that  vitiated,the  other 
is  blown^i  and  deflowr'd.,    Doe  wee  not  fee,  if  the  mind  languifli ,  the 
members  arc  duil .  Lookc  upon  an  effeminate  perfon :  his  very  gate 
confcffethhim.    If  amao  be  fiery,  his  motion  is  foi  if  angry^'tis  trou- 
bled, lind  violent.  So  that  w?c  may  conclude:  Whcrcfocvcr,flianncrs, 

and 

S  ^/ 


CHAPTER  IX. 
Ben  Jonson's  Discoveries  or  Explorata. 

The  jewel  that  we  find,  we  stop  and  take  it, 
Because  we  see  it ;  but  what  we  do  not  see, 
We  tread  upon,  and  never  think  of  it. 

The  evidence  I  am  now  about  to  adduce  is  derived  from  a  quo- 
tation from  the  poet  Horace,  applied  by  Ben  Jonson  to  Bacon's 
De  Augmentis  Scientiarum,  which  latter  was  published  1623,  the 
same  year  as  the  first  collected  edition  of  the  plays,  known  as  the 
1623  folio  Shakespeare. 

The  Latin  quotation  applied  to  the  De  Augmentis  is  borrowed 
from  Horace's  Arte  Poetica,  and  is  found  in  direct  context  with  the 
invention  of  the  art  of  play-writing.  But,  first,  let  me  give  Ben 
Jonson's  words : 

"  Witness  the  case  of  Julius  Ccesar,  who,  in  the  heat  of  the  civil 
war,  writ  his  book  of  Analogy  and  dedicated  them  to  Tully.  This 
made  the  late  Lord  St.  Albans  entitle  his  work  Novum  Organum, 
which,  though  by  the  most  of  superficial  men,  who  cannot  get  beyond 
the  titleof  NominalSyit  is  not  penetrated  nor  understood,  it  really 
openeth  all  defects  of  learning  whatsoever,  and  is  a  book.'* 
Qui  longum  noto  scriptori  porriget  sevum. 

{Discoveries,  p.  102,  1641.) 
In  the  margin  we  read,  De  Augmentis  Scientiarum^  and  against 
the  citation,  Horat :  De  Arte  Foetica.  Now,  very  curiously,  in  the 
same  volume  of  Ben  Jonson's  works,  I  find  a  translation  by  him  of 
this,  De  Arte  Poetica,  by  Horace — the  Latin  on  one  side,  the  trans- 
lation on  the  other : 

Ficta,  voluptatis  causa,  sint  proxima  veris. 
Nee  quodcunque,  volet ;  poscat  sibi  fabula  credi : 
Neu  pransse  Laml^  vivum  puerum  extrahat  alvo. 
Centuriae  seniorem  agitant  expertia  frugis : 
Celsi  praetereunt  austera  poemata  Ehamnes. 
Omne  tulit  punctum,  qui  miscuit  utile  dulci, 
Lectorem  delectando,  pariterque  monendo, 
Hie  meret  cera  liber  Sosiis  ;  hie  et  mare  transit, 
Et  longum  noto  scriptori  porriget  cevum, 

(Printed  1640.) 
The  last  line  is  the  one  quoted  by  Ben  Jonson,  and  applied  to 

161 


162  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

the  De  Augmentis,  which  latter,  please  note,  was  translated  into 
English  for  the  first  time  in  1640,  by  Gilbert  Wats ;  therefore,  ap- 
pears the  same  year  as  this  poem  (quoted  from)  by  Jonson.  Ben 
Jonson's  translation  is  thus : 

Let  what  thou  feign'st  for  pleasures  sake,  be  near 
The  truth ;  nor  let  thy  fable  think  what  e're 
It  would,  must  be:  lest  it  alive  would  draw 
The  child,  when  Lamia  has  dined,  out  of  her  maw. 
The  poems  void  of  profit,  our  grave  men 
Cast  out  by  voices ;  want  they  pleasure,  then 
Our  gallants  give  them  none,  but  pass  them  by; 
But  he  hath  every  suffrage  can  apply 
Sweet  mixed  with  sour,  to  his  reader,  so 
As  doctrine  and  delight  together  go. 
This  book  will  get  the  Sosii  money  ;  this 
Will  pass  the  seas,  and  long  as  nature  is, 
With  honor  make,  the  far  known  author  live. 
(p.  23,  Horace  of  the  Art  of  Poetic,  1640.) 
All  this  is  a  description,  by  Horace,  of  Dramatical  and  Poeti- 
cal Composition,  its  laws,  with  directions  for  success.    Horace  in- 
troduces Orpheus,  Amphion,  Homer,  TyrtcBus. — 

Ludusque  repertus 
Et  longorum  operum  finis,  ne  forte  pudori 
Sit  tibi  Musa  lyrse  solers,  et  cantor  Apollo. 

Ben  Jonson's  translation : 

Plays  were  found  out  ;  and  rest  the  end  and  crown 
Of  their  long  labours  was  in  verse  set  down. 
All  which  I  tell,  lest  when  Apollo's  named. 
Or  muse  upon  the  Lyre,  thou  chance  be  ashamed. 

(p.  23.) 
The  fourth  line  from  the  last  introduces  the  passage  already 
quoted: 

Ficta  voluptatis  causa,  sint  proxima  veris. 
Now  the  reader  will  perceive  how  extraordinarily  apposite  these 
lines  are  to  describe  the  De  Augmentis,  which  Bacon  compares  to  a 
ship  sailing  through  time,  an  emblem  he  borrowed  from  the  dis- 
covery of  the  New  World  to  illustrate  his ''  New  World  of  Sciences, " 
which  the  Be  Augmentis  is  to  open  up : 

This  (book) 
Will  pass  the  seas,  and  long  as  nature  is, 
With  honor  make  the  far  known  Author  live. 

But  this  single  parallel  is  not  all ;  for  in  context  with  Orpheus 
(who  Bacon  introduces  as  "  Orpheus  Theatre,"  page  49  Be  Aug- 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  163 

mentis,  translated  by  Wats  1640),  I  find  a  few  lines  preceding,  and 
leading  to  those  already  cited,  the  following,  which  is  an  exact 
description  of  the  sort  of  Acromatical  or  Parabolical  Style 
in  which  the  De  Augmentis  is  written: 

Silvestres  homines  sacer,  interpresque  Deorum, 
Csedibus  et  victn  fsedo  deterruit  Orpheus, 
Dictus  ob  hoc  lenire  tigres,  rapidosque  leones. 
Dictus  et  Amphion  Thebanas  conditor  arcis 
Saxo  movere  sono  testudinis,  et  prece  blanda 
Ducere  quo  vellet.    Fuit  hcec  sapientia  quondam, 
Publica  privatis  secernere,  sacra  profanis, 
Concubitu  prohibere  vago. 

Here  is  Bacon's  favorite  Orpheus,  and  just  that  enigmatical  and 
veiled  parabolical  style  described,  which  Bacon  introduces  in  context 
with  Dramatical  Poetry,  pages  107,  108  of  this  same  Be  Augmentis 
(which  he  describes  as  "  flying  too  high  over  men's  heads  from  the 
obscurity  of  the  style  which  was  to  select  its  reader").  Ben  Jonson's 
translation  of  the  lines  I  have  placed  in  Italics  runs : 

This  was  the  wisdom  that  they  had  of  old. 
Things  sacred,  from  profane  to  separate  ; 
The  public  from  the  private  to  abate. 

(p.  23  H.) 

Compare  :  "  There  is  another  use  of  Parabolical  Poesy,  opposite 
to  the  former,  which  tendeth  to  the  folding  up  of  those  things  the 
dignity  whereof,  deserves  to  be  retired  and  distinguished,  as  with 
A  DRAWK  CURTAIN.  That  is  whcu  the  secrets  and  mysteries  of 
Rehgion,  Policy  and  Philosophy  are,  veiled  and  invested  with  fables 
and  parables."  (P.  108,  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.)  This  is 
in  context,  and  follows  out  of  Bacon's  description  of  Dramatical 
Representative  Poesy,  upon  the  previous  page  107.  And  to  show 
what  Bacon  means  upon  this  same  page,  he  introduces,  with  an 
asterisk,  his  ''  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients, "  as  a  Deficient  of  his  "  New 
World  of  Sciences."  {Sapientia  Veterum  6th  star  or  asterisk  of 
A  New  World  of  Sciences  or  the  Deficients.  Catalogue  at  end  of 
Advancement,  1640.) 

The  hint  Bacon  gives  us  for  the  theatre  and  its  drawn  curtain,  is 
one  of  those  felicitous  touches,  which,  like  one  of  the  titles  of  the 
Advancement,  (Bacon  applies  to  it),  y\z.,  the  Intellectual  Globe,  recaWs 
the  Globe  Theatre  itself,  where  the  immortal  pieces  ascribed  to 
Shakespeare  were  acted. 

If  the  reader  will  count  the  italic  words  upon  page  102  of  Ben 
Jonson's  Timber  or  Discoveries  (1641,  first  edition),  he  will  find  the 


164  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

word  (applied  to  Bacon,  "  mark  and  acme  of  our  language  "),  mark 
is  the  36tli  word  in  order,  counting  from  tlie  top  of  the  page.  There 
are  36  plays  in  the  1623  folio.  If  the  count  is  continued,  it  is  remark- 
able to  find  the  first  word  of  the  Latin  quotation  from  Horace's 
''  Art  of  Poetry  J "  is  the  52d  or  53d  word  in  italics,  according  as  we 
count  the  word  '*  Commonwealth^^  as  a  single  hyphenated  word,  or 
as  two  words.  The  words  in  italics  are:  Cicero,  Bome,  Empire, 
Ingenium  par  imperio,  Seculum,  Sir  Thomas  More  Wiat,  Henry, 
Surrey,  Chaloner,  Smith,  Cliot,  Gardiner,  Nico  Bacon,  Elizabeths, 
Philip  Sidney,  Hooker,  Essex,  Walter  Bawleigh,  Henry  Savilc, 
Edivin  Sandes,  Egerton,  Successor,  Greece,  Bome,  Eloquence,  Markc, 
I  have,  State,  Commonwealth,  Seminaries,  Bepublick,  Advancement, 
Julius  Ccesar,  Analogic,  Tully,  Albane,  Novum  Organum,  Nominals, 
Qui  longum  nolo  scriptori  porriget  JEvum.  If  the  reader  will 
kindly  check  and  number  these  words  in  succession,  he  will  find  I 
am  correct  in  my  numbers,  and  that  the  line  cited  from  Horace, 
carries  Shakespeare's  age  1616, — that  is  52  and  53.  If  the  italicized 
words  in  the  marginal  notes,  entitled  Scriptorium  Catalogus,  are 
likewise  counted  down,  it  is  curious  to  again  find  the  number  36 
brings  us  to  Francis  (Bacon).  If  in  the  same  marginal  text  we 
count  all  the  words  together  (initials  also),  we  find  Sir  (Francis 
Bacon)  the  53d  word.  If  these  coincidences  stood  alone  they  might 
be  attributed  to  accident,  but  there  are  such  a  number  of  them 
elsewhere,  it  is  impossible  to  escape  conviction,  all  this  is  part  of  a 
profound  system  of  cipher  by  means  of  mathematics. 

I  particularly  desire  to  draw  the  student's  attention  to  column 
106  of  the  Comedies,  whereon  we  find  the  line  (p.  53,  Merry  Wives 
of  Windsor)  : 

Hang-Hog  is  Latin  for  Bacon  I  warrant  you. 

The  reader  will  perceive  this  word  Hang- Hog  is  hyphenated,  and 
therefore  it  may  be  counted  as  one  or  two  words.  The  column  pag- 
ing is  very  important  in  this  cypher,  and  it  stands  to  reason- the 
columns  must  not  only  be  correctly  numbered,  but  are  real  factors  in 
the  problem.  The  fact  Shakespeare  died  in  1616  in  his  fifty-third 
year,  as  recorded  on  the  Stratford  monument  (erected  whilst  his 
widow  and  family  were  alive),  and  that  we  refind  the  word 
Bacon  not  only  on  this  page,  but  also  twice  on  page  52  of  1st 
K.  H.  IV.  (which  page  is  mispaged  54  from  false  49,  two  in  advance 
of  the  real  number),  is  a  re-indorsement  of  the  theory  I  hold  of  the 
portrait  standing  in  the  frame  by  mathematics.  Bacon  being  brought 


To  the  memory  of  my  beloucd, 
The  AVTHOR 

Mr.  Will  I  AM   Shakespea  re: 

And 

what  he  hath  left  vs. 

1 0  dram  m  enuy  (^Shakefpearc)  on  thj  name, 
'     Am  I  thus  ample  td  thy  Boeke  and  Fame  t 

\iVhile  I  confeffe  thy  writings  tobefuch. 

As  neither  Man,  mr  Mufc » canprai/e  too  much, 
'Tii  true^  and  all  mens  fuffrage.  But  thefe  waves 

ff^ere  not  the  paths  I  meant  vnto  thypraife : 
forfeeltefi  Ignorance  on  thefe  may  light ^ 

Whieh^  when  it  founds  at  beftjbstt  ecchos  right , 
Or  bltnde  jffeSiion^  vphich  dcth  ne're  aduance 

The  truth  ^  but  gropes^  and  vrgtth  all  by  chance  5 
Or  crafty  Malice^  might  pretend  thisprai/e^ 

And  thinke  ta  ruine^  where  itfeem'dto  raife. 
Thefe  are^  as  fame  infamous  Baud^  orffhore^ 

should prai/e  a  Matron.  iVhat  could  hurt  her  mere  f 
But  thou  artproofeagainjlthem^  andtndeed 
Aboue  th' ill  fortune  of  them  ^  or  the  rued, 
7,  therefore  will  begin,  Soule  of  the  Age  / 

The  applaufe  !  delight !  the  wonder  of  our  Stage  [ 
My  Shakcfpearc,  rfe  j  /  will  not  lodge  thee  by 
Chaucer,  or  Spcnfer,  or  ^/^f  Beaumont  lye 
A  lit  tie  further ^  to  make  thee  4  roome : 

Thou  art  a  Monifnent^  without  a  tombe, 
And  art  aliuefiU^  while  thy  Booke  doth  liue^ 

And  we  haue  wits  to  ready  andpraife  togiue^ 
That  J  not  mixe  theefo,  my  braineexcufes  5 

I  meane  with  great  ^  but  dijprtportion  d  Mufts : 
For^ifj  thought  my  iudgement  were  ofyeeres, 
ijhould  commit  thee furely  with  thy  peeres. 
And  tell^  h<fwfarre  thou  didHjl  our  Lily  out-Jbine, 

Orfuorting  Kid ,  or  Marlowcs  mtghtj  line. 
And  though  thou  hadffnt&ll  Latine,  and  leffe  Grccfce, 

From  thence  to  honour  thee^  i  would  mtfeehe 
Tor  names-  but  call  firth  thund'ring  iEfchiluSj 

Eurlpicfcs,  and  Sophocles  tot/s^     .  - 
Paccuuius,  Accius,  him  e/Cordoua  dead^ 

To  life againe^  teheare  thy  BuskiH  tread. 
And  (hake  a  Stage  :0r,  when  thy  Sockes  vert  on^ 
teattc  tke  alom.fer  theeomparifm 


Rom  the  moft  al)le,to  him  that  can  but  fpelh  There 
you  are  number'd.We  had  rather  you  were  weighd. 
Efpccially,  when  the  fate  of  all  Bookes  depends  vp^ 
on  your  capacities  :  and  not  of  your  heads  alone, 
but  of  your  purfes.  Well !  It  is  now  publicjue,  &  you 
wilftand  for  your  priiiiledges  wee  know:  to  read, 
and  cenfure .  Do  fo,but  buy  it  firft.  That  dothbcft 
commend  a  Booke,  the  Stationer  faies.  Then^how  odde  foeuer  your 
braines  be,  or  your  wifedomes,  make  your  licence,  the  fame^andlpare 
not.  ludge  your  fixe-pen'orth,  yourlbillings  worth,  your  fiue  (hil- 
lings worth  at  a  time,  or  higher,  fo  you  rife  to  the  iuft  rates,  and  wel- 
come. But,  what  euer  you  dOj  Buy.  Cenfure  will  not  driuc  a  Trade, 
ormake  thelacke  go.  And  though  you  be  a  Magiftrate  of  wit,  and  fie 
on  the  Stage  at  !B/dc^-Fr/>rj,orthe  (;oc%/>,  to  arraigne Play es  dailie, 
know,  thefe  Playcs  haue  had  their  triall  alreadie,  and  flood  outaH^p- 
pealesj  and  do  how  come  forth  quitted  rather  by  a  Decree  of  Co'^rt^ 
then  any  purchased  Letters  of  commendation. . 

It  had  bene  a  thing, we  confefle,  worthie  to  hauebene  wi{hed,that 
the  Author  himfelfe  had  liu  d  to  haue  fet  forth,  and  ouerfeen  his  o  wne 
"writings ,-  But  fince  it  hath  bin  ordain  d  otherwifcjandheby  death  de- 
parted  from  that  right,we  pray  you  do  not  envie  his  Friends^the  ofEce 
of  their  care,  and  paine,  to  haue  colledted  &  publiCh'd  them,^  and  fo  to 
hauepubliQi'd  them,  as  where  (before)  you  were  abus'd  with  diuetfe 
ftolne,  and  furreptitious  copies,  maimed,and  deformed  by  the  frauds 
and  ftealthes  of  iniurious  impoftors,  that  expos'd  them :  euen  thofc, 
are  now  offerd  to  your  view  cur  d,  andperfe(5t  of  their  hmbes,-  and  all 
the  reft,  abfolute  in  their  numbers,  as  he  conceiued  the.Who,as  he  was 
a  happie  imitator  of  Nature,was  a  raoft  gentle  expreffer  of  it.His  mind 
andhand  went  together:  And  what  he  thought,  he  vttered  with  that 
eafihefle,  that  wee  haue  fcarfe  receiued  from  him  a  blot  in  his  papers. 
But  it  isnbt  our  prouince,who  onely  gather  his  works,  and  giue  them 
you,  topraifehim.  It  is  yours  that  reade  him.  And  there  wehope,to 
your  diucrs  capacities,  you  willfinde  enough,  both  to  draw,  and  hold 
you :  for  his  wit  can  no  more  lie  hid,  then  it  could  be  loft.  Reade  him, 
therefore  5  and  againe,  andagaine :  And  if  then  you  doe  not  like  him, 
furely  you  are infomc  manifeft  danger, not  to  vnderftand him.  And  io 
weleaueyou  to  other  of  his  Friends,  whom  ifybu  need,can  bee  your 
guides :  if  you  neede  them  not,  you  can  leade  jour  felues^aad  others, 
And  fuch  Readers  we  wifti  him< 


Vpon  the  Linesand  Life  of  the  Famous 

Scenickc  Poet,  Matter  W  i  l  l  i  a  m 

SHAKESPEARE. 

I  Hofc  hands,  which  you  To  clapt,  go  now,  and  wring 
You  BritMfKs  brauej  for  done  are  shAkejfures  c/aycs : 
His  daycs  arc  done,  that inadc  the  dainty  Playcs, 
J  Which  made  the  Globe  ofhcau  n  and  canh  ro  ring. 
_____    SPry'dc  is  that  vcinc,  dry'd  is  the  Thef^'an  Spring, 
Tura'd  all  to  tearcs,and  ?heehuiA^\xA^  hisrayes : 
That  cor  p's,  that  coffin  now  bcftickc  ihofc  baycs. 
Which  crown'd  him  foet  firft,  then  foeti  King. 
XiTngedies  might  any  ?rtfiig«^hauCj 
Allthofe  he  made,  would  fcarfe  make  one  to  this  * 
Where  Fdme^  now  that  he  gone  is  to  the  graue 
(Deaths  publique  tyring-boufc^  the  Nund/uis, 
For  though  his  line  oi  life  went  foone  about. 
The  lifcycc  of  his  lines  (hall  neucr  out. 


nVGH  HOLL^i^D 


The  Mtrry  Wtues  o/ffindfir. 


t3 


P«rd.  A  Buck-baiket  > 

Fdd.  Yes :  a  Buck-basket :  ram'd  mec  In  with  foute 
Shirts  and  Smockes,  Socks,  fou!e  Stockings,  greafie 
Napkins,  that  (Mafler  Brttme)  there  was  the  ranked 
compound  of  rilUnous  (ateW^  that  cuer  offended  no- 
ftrlll. 

Ford.  And  how  long  l«y  you  there? 

iW.  ,Nay,  you  fliall  hearc  (M after  Brcome)  what  I 
bauefuffcro,  to  bring  this  ^otnan  to  cuill,  for  youi 
goodt  Being  thus  eram'd  in  the  Basket,  a  couple  of 
ftr«^knaUes,  hi«  Hind«,vfere  cald  forth  by  their  Ml- 
ftris»to  carry  mce  in  the  flame  of  foule  Gloathes  to 
'Dtitchet-ldnt :  they  tooke  me  on  their  fhoulders  i  met 
the  ieaiout  knaue  their  MaRer  in  the  doore ;  who 
aik'd  them,  once  or  twice  what  they  had  in  their  Baf- 
ket  ?  I  quaVd  for  feare  leaft  the  Lunatidue  Knaue 
would  haue  feat ch'd  it :  but  Fate  (ordaining  he  ftiould 
be  a  Cuckold)  held  hit  hawdi  well,  onwcnthce,  for 
a  ifeacch ,  and  away  went  1  for  fouie  Cloathes  r  But 
markethefequell(Mafter5rw«^)  Ifuflfcred  the  pang* 
of  three  feuerall  deaths :  Firft,  an  btollerable  fright, 
to  be  dete^ed  -with  a  iealious  rotten  Bell-weather : 
Next  to  be  compafs'd  like  a  good  Bilbo  in  the  circum- 
ference of  a  Pecke,  hilt  to  point,  heele  to  head.  And 
theniobeftoptin  like  a  ftrong  diftillation  with  (link- 
ing Cloathcs,  that  fretted  in  their  owne  ereafc: 
thinke  of  that,  a  man  of  my  Kidney;  thiiikeof  that, 
that  am  as  fubie6l  to  heate  as  butter ;  a  man  of  conti- 
nuall  difTolution,  and  thaw:  it  was  a  miracle  to  fcape 
fuffocaiion.  And  in  the  height  of  this  Bath  (when  I 
was  more  then  halfc  ftew'd  in  greafc  (like  a  Dutch- 
difh)  to  be  throwne  into  the  Thames,  and 
coold,  glowing-hot,  in  that  ferge  like  a  Horfc- 
ihoo;  thinke  of  that ;  hiding  hot :  thinke  of  that(MaRer 
Br»eme,) 

ford.   In  good  fadnelTe  Sir,I  am  forTy,that  for  my  fake 
you  haue  fufferd  all  this. 

My  fuite  then  is  defperatc :  You'll  vndcrtake  her  no 
more? 

Fal.  Martcr  Broome  x  I  will  be  throwne  into  Etna, 
as  I  haue  becneincoThames,ere  I  will  leauc  her  thus; 
her  Husband  is  this  morning  gone  a  Birding :  I 
haue  receiued  from  her  another  ambaflie  of  mee- 
ting .•  *twi«  eight  and  nine  is  the  hourc  (  Maftcr 
Broome.') 

Ford.  'Tis  paft  eight  already  Sir. 

F/tl.  Is  it  ?  I  will  then  addreflc  mee  to  my  appoint- 
ment :  Come  to  mce  at  your  conuenient  leifure ,  and 
you  (hall  know  how  I  fpeede :  and  the  conclufion 
fhjll  be  crowned  with  your  enioyingher:  adiew.*  you 
fliall  haue  her  (Maftcr  Broome)  Maftcr  Broome^  you  (ball 
cuckold  f«r</. 

Ford.  Hum: ha?  Is  thi4 a viiion ?  Isthisadreame? 
doc  1  fleepc  ?  Maftcr  Ford  awake,  awake  Mafter  Ford : 
ther'sahole  made  in  youtbeft  co>te  (Mafter  Fordi)x.h\% 
'tis  to  be  married}'  thii'titto  haue  Lynnen,  and  Buck- 
baskets  :  Well,  I  will  ptoclaimc  my  felfe  what  I  am  : 
1  will  now  take  the  Leather;  hec  i»8i  myhoufe  :  hcc 
cannot fcape me ! 'tis impoflible  hee  ftiould:  hce  can- 
not  crecpeintoa  halfe-pennypurfe,  nor  into  a  Pcppcr- 
Boxe:  But  Icaftthe  Diuell  that  guides  him,  fbould 
aide  hitn ,  I  will  fearch  impoflible  places :  though 
what]  ana, I  cannot  auoide;  yet  to  be  what  I  would 
not,  (hall  not  make  me  tame :  If  I  haue  homes,  to  ftiake 
onemai, letViiepMuecbegoe  with  me,  Hebe  horne- 
'  inad.  Sxtunt. 


r 


JBus  Quartus,  Sccena  Trima, 


E»terMijiru  P*ie,^Kkly,mii4mj£»Mt. 

Mifl.Pag.  Is  he  at  Wi.fords  already  think'ft  thou  ? 

^»,  Sure  he  is, IjY  this;  or  will  be  prefently }   but 

truclyheisverycouragiotismad,  about  his  throwing 

into  the  water.  Miftris  Ford  defires  you  to  come  fo- 

dainety. 

THifi.Pag.  liebewithhct  by  and  by:llebt«  bfJng 
myyong-nian  here  to  Schoole :  looke  where  his  Mafter 
come* ;  'tis  a  playing  day  I  fee :  how  now  Sir  hmrh^  d6 
Schoole  to  day?  . 

Em4.  NoiMafter  Slender  is  let  the  Boyei  Icaue  to  play. 

Q»i.  "Ble(ring  of  his  heart.  ' 

Mifi.Psg.  Sir  Hugh.my  husband  faies  my  fonne  pro- 
fits nothing  in  the  world  at  his  Booke:  1  pray  you  aske 
him  fome  queftions  in  his  Accidence. 

Em.  Come  hither  IKiUumi  ^oW  vp  your  hcadjcome. 

Mifl.V4g.  Come-on Sirba I  holdtp  your  head;  an. 
fwere  your  Maftcr,  be  not  afraid. 

Eh4.  fyilli4m,hovt  many  Numberris  inNownes? 

mS.  Two. 

^Mi.  Truely^  I  thought  there  had  bin  one  Nambet 
more,becaufc  they  fay  od's-Nowncs. 

Ei*4.  Peace.your  tatlitigs.  What  is  (FmreJnUidm  ? 

fVta.  Pnleher. 

Si»'  Po wlcats?  there  ate/airer  things  then  Po wlcaa, 
fute. 

E»4.  You  are  a  very  (implicity  ©man:  Iprayyoo 
peace.  What  is  (£,4tpftr)  ;f/&v«w  ? 

lyil.  A  Stone. 

EuA.  And  what  is  a  Stone  (mUiam  f) 

fFiB.  APeeble. 

Eud.  No  J  it  IS  Lapis :  I  pray  you  remember  In  TOnr 
praine. 

ma.  Lofit. 

Eua.  That  is  a  good  mSidm:  what  is  he{1Fillutm)thlit 
do'slend  Articles. 

(ViM.  Articles  arc  borrowed  of  the  Pronoune ;  and  be 
thus  declined.  Siogultfriter  tomindtiuehic  bdc,hoc, 

Eua.  Nominating  hig^agjhog :  pray  you  matke :  gent' 
tiuohHita:  Well ;  what  \%yom  j1ecmfatlMe.cafe} 

fVitt,  j4ccufatiftohi»c. 

Sua.  I  pray  you  haue  your  remembrance  (childe)^^- 
cnfatiuo  hi>ig,ha»g^hog. 

Qh.  Hang-hog,  is  latten  for  Bacon  J  warrantyott. 

Sua.  Leaueyour  ftihles^o'taui^V/iminheFcct' 
tiuecafe^fKlHamf) 

mil.  Off^tcatiMOfO. 

Sna.  Remember  fflllsam,Pocatiue,  is  C0«t. 

Q»^  And  that's  a  eoodroote. 
£m.  0'man,forDeare.' 

■MtJt.Pag.  Peace. 

Eho-.  \f^hin9yo\iTGtnitiiieeafiffyiraS(mli4m}) 

jViH.  Genitiuecafe} 

Eua.  1. 

It^ill.  GenitiHeboriim,harKm,hartim. 

Qh.  'Vengeance  ofGinyes  cafe ;  fie  on  her ;  netiet 
namcherfchilde)  if(he'bea  whoie. 

Eita.  Forfhameo'man. 

_<Vf*.  You  doe  ill  lo  teach  the  childe  fuch  words :  hee 
teaches  him  to  hie,  and  to  hac ;  which  they  11  doe  faft 
enough  of  themfelucs,  and  to  caWhorttm;  fie  f  pon you. 
E  3  ^,'Oman 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  165 

in  as  a  word  on  these  pages,  52,  53.  Now,  if  ttie  reader  will  care- 
fully count  the  words  both  down  and  up  this  column  106,  he  will 
find  the  line  quoted  is  as  follows : 


Down  column 
106. 

(     Hang    263. 
Hog      264. 

or; 

263. 

(  100. 
99. 

I  99    (up  column, 

106) 

p.  53  M.  W.  W. 

is        265. 

Latin    266. 

for       267. 

Bacon  268. 

I        269. 

warrant  270. 

you.      271. 

264. 

265. 

266.     ■ 

267. 

268. 

269. 

270. 

98. 
97. 
%Q. 
95. 
94. 
93. 
92. 

Amongst  the  chief  verses  dedicated  to  the  author  of  the  plays, 
one  stands  preeminent,  written  by  Bon  Jonson  (which  already  has 
claimed  attention  from  Mr.  Donnelly's  pen),  and  is  to  be  found  at 
the  commencement  of  the  1623  Folio  Plays.  If  the  student  will 
turn  to  this  poem,  commencing : 

To  draw  no  envy  (Shakespeare)  on  thy  name, 
Am  I  thus  ample  to  thy  Booke  and  Fame, 

While  I  confesse  thy  writings  to  he  such. 
As  neither  Man,  nor  Muse,  can  praise  too  much, 

he  will  find  on  the  32d  line  these  words  : 

I  would  not  seek 
For  names — 

If  the  reader  will  carefully  count  every  word  in  succession,  from  the 
commencement  of  the  poem,  down  to  these  words,  he  will  find  the 
words,  "■  Seek  for  names,''  the  266th,  267th,  268th,  or  267th,  268th, 
269th,  according  as  we  count ''  out-shine,''  as  a  single  word  or  two 
words.  If  the  reader  will  now  count  the  words  upon  page  53, 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  column  106,  he  will  find  the  words  : 

Bacon  I  warrant 

the  267th,  268th,  269th,  likewise  down  the  column,  counted  from  the 
top,  "  Hang-Hog  "  being  treated  as  a  single  word. 

As  the  critic  may  object  to  any  arbitrary  treatment  of  hyphen- 
ated words,  of  which  there  is  a  single  example  in  each  collated  pas- 
sage, I  will  give  the  alterative  counts  in  each  case,  viz.,  counting 
"  Hang-Hog  "  as  one,  and  then  as  two  words,  and  also  counting  out- 
shine as  one,  and  then  as  two  words.  The  reader  will  perceive,  no 
matter  how  we  collate  the  poem  with  page  53,  column  106,  Merry 
Wives  of  Windsor,  the  suspicious  words,  "  seek  for  names,"  falls  into 
congruity  with  and  against  the  word  '*  Bacon !  " 


166 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 


Hog  treated 
single  word 


i  as  a   S 


Hang  Hog  treated  as 
two  words, 


For     266 

Bacon  267 

I        268 

For     267 

Bacon  268 

1        269 


Out-shine  as 

single  word 


Out-shine  as 

two  words, 


A 


Seek    266 

for      267 

ames.   268 


267 
268 
269 


for 


If  we  count  a  hyphenated  word  in  one  case  as  a  single  word,  it  is 
only  rational  we  do  likewise  in  the  other  case.    But  even  if  we  out- 
rage this  rule,  and  try  the  cipher  collusion  by  the  next  possible 
count,  of  treating  "  Hang-Hog  "  as  one  word,  and  "  out-shine  ''  as. 
two  words,  we  get  the  same  result : 


Hang-Hog, 

one  word, 


Hang-Hog, 

two  words, 


Bacon  267 

I        268 

warrant,  269 


For 
Bacon 


267 
268 


Out-shine, 

two  words. 


Out-shine, 
one  word. 


Seek 
for 


For 

names. 


267 
268 
209 


267 
268 


The  impartial  critic  will  do  me  the  justice  to  allow,  I  have  evaded 
no  dif&culty,  or  possible  collating  of  the  figures,  which  may  be  hostile 
to  my  discovery.  The  only  four  possible  alternative  counts  and 
collusions  (by  congruity  of  cipher  counts)  have  been  exhausted,  with 
always  the  same  result,  that  the  words,  ^^  seek  for  names,  ^^  agree 
with  the  words,  "  Bacon  I  warrant,'^  or  hold  an  apparent  answer  to 
the  implied  query,  in  the  words,  ^'For  Bacon. "  It  may  be  observed, 
Ben  Jonson  writes :  "  I  would  not  seek  for  names, "  and  then  praises 
Shakespeare  solely/  as  an  actor!  Extraordinary  as  this  cipher  con- 
gruity of  figures  is,  I  am  quite  ready  to  confess,  if  it  stood  alone,  it 
might  be  open  to  criticism  to  declare  it  mere  coincidence.  But  it 
does  not  stand  singly  or  unsupported  by  other  evidence,  all  tending 
to  show  page  53,  col.  106,  of  the  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  is  a 
great  cipher  text  page,  or  Philosophical  Grammar,  to  which  this 
cipher  problem  of  the  authorship  of  the  plays  is  to  be  tested  and 
referred  to. 

For  example,  in  one  of  the  prefaces  to  this  same  folio  Plays  (first 
edition  1623),  is  an  address  by  John  Heminge  and  Henry  Condell  (the 
pubhshers),  "  To  the  Great  Variety  of  Beaders,'^  which  I  here  also 
reproduce  in  fac-simile.  The  second  paragraph  opens,  *'  It  had 
been  a  thing,  we  confess,  worthy  to  have  been  wished,  that  the 
AUTHOR  HIMSELF  had  Uvcd  to  havc  set  forth  his  own  writings.  ^^ 
This  is  the  only  entry  of  the  word  author  in  this  preface.  If  the 
reader  will  count  the  words  up,  from  the  bottom  of  the  page,  he  will 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  167 

find  "  AUTHOR  "  the  267th  word,  agreeing  with  the  word  "  Bacon  ^^ 
267  {Hang- Hog  coxmted  as  one  word),  page  53,  col.  106,  Merry  Wives 
of  Windsor.  It  may  be  observed  there  are  no  hyphenated,  double, 
or  ambiguous  words,  in  this  count.  It  is  open  to  the  critic  to  include 
the  names  of  John  Heminge  and  Henry  Condell  in  the  count  if  he 
likes,  but  I  think  this  is  hardly  legitimate. 

If  we  now  collate  again  with  page  53,  col.  106  Merry  Wives  of 
Windsor,  we  get : 

P.  53  M.  W.  W. 

Jiang  Hog. 

{ One  word. ) 

P.  53  M.  W.  W. 

Hang  Hog. 

( Two  woi'ds. )  (^ 

If  we  include  the  four  words  of  the  names  of  John  Heminge  and 
Henry  Condell  in  the  count,  we  get  this  extraordinary  result;  a 
cipher  statement,  that  Bacon  had  lived  to  set  forth  and  oversee  his 
own  writings: 

p.  53  M.  W.  W.   (  I      269.  Preface     ^  had    269.        (counted  up). 

Hang  Hog.  }     Bacon  268.  Folio  1623  }  lived  268.       (counted  up). 

(Two  words.)        (. 


5     Author,  267. 
\     himself  266. 

Up  the  page. 

Bacon  267 

For  266 

Bacon  268 

5            the  268. 

Up  the  page. 

For  267 

;      Author  267. 

You    270.  (  himself  270. 

Hang  Hog.           J  "Warrant  269.  J     had      269. 

as  one  word.)        1          1        268.  1    lived     268. 

Bacon  267.  I       to      267. 


If  we  read  the  last  collated  passage  in  sequence,  (up,  from  left  to 
right,  down),  we  get  part  of  a  complete  sentence,  Bacon  I  warrant 
you,  himself  had  lived  to  (set  forth  and  oversee  his  own  writing?) 
The  reader  will  see  this  is  a  second  endorsement  of  my  theory,  that 
page  53  M.  W.  of  W.,  col.  106,  is  a  table  of  cipher  reference. 

I  present  the  reader  now  with  a  fac-simile  reproduction  of  page 
21,  Bacon's  History  of  King  Henry  the  Seventh,  first  edition  1622. 
This  page  has  already  been  commented  upon,  and  the  cipher  con- 
nection between  it  and  page  53,  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor j  col.  106, 
established  in  my  last  work,  Francis  Bacon,  Poet,  Prophet  and  Phi- 
losopJier,  (Kegan  Paul,  French,  Triibner  &  Co.,  1891,  London).  But 
as  this  page  21  alluded  to,  was  not  reproduced  in  fac-simile,  but  only 
set  up  in  type,  doubts  may  exist  as  to  the  genuineness  of  the  figures. 
I  therefore  place  the  reader  in  the  position  of  having  Bacon's 
History,  (so  far  as  this  page  21  is  concerned)  before  his  eyes.  The 
only  way  of  establishing  the  validity  of  this  cipher  problem  in  the 
eyes  of  the  public,  is  to  present  the  pages  themselves.    I  am  con- 


Page  21.  C     This         268,  or  267,  or  268,  or  267.    54  up.    53  over- 

Hist  K.  H.  YII.     ■?     Stage  I     269         268  >     269         268      53  the    52  thr 


168  THE  GOLUMUBS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

vinced  no  statements  of  any  kind  have  the  weight  or  force,  that  one 
single  self-made  discovery  of  the  correctness  of  the  counts  (proving 
cipher  congruity)  has  on  the  individual  mind.  The  reader  is  there- 
fore asked  to  audit  these  figures  for  himself  ?  There  is  no  more 
convincing  proof  in  the  world  than  that  of  mathematics.  For  it  is 
impossible  these  congruities  of  numbers,  occurring  over  and  over 
again,  can  be  the  result  of  chance.  In  proportion  as  they  multiply, 
—  which  they  will, — the  plea  of  coincidence  must  disappear. 

Upon  counting  the  words  down  the  page,  we  find  two  hyphen- 
ated words,  withdrawing -chamber  and  stage-play,  which  I  count 
respectively  as  double  and  single  words: 

C     This 
.     }     Stage  > 
1622.  (     Play   \     270        269  ^  one  word,  do      52  page  51  one  word. 

This  collated  with  page  53,  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  is  very 
remarkable,  because,  whether  we  count  "  over-throw  "  as  a  single  or 
double  word,  the  number  53  is  brought  against  267,  or  268,  or  269. 
Now,  upon  page  53  (Shakespeare's  age  1616,  when  he  died).  Merry 
Wives  of  Windsor  (column  106)  the  word  Bacon,  as  we  have  shown, 
is  either  267  or  268  (counted  down  the  column),  according  as  Hang- 
Hog  is  counted  doubly  or  singly.  The  result  of  collating,  by  con- 
gruity of  numbers,  these  two  pages  is  : 

P.  21, 
K.  H.    YII. 

No  student  who  audits  these  numbers  will  question  this  cannot 
be  the  result  of  coincidence  or  chance.  This  page  21  of  the  History 
of  King  Henry  the  Seventh,  therefore,  identifies  the  word  or  words, 
"  stage-play^^  (by  a  cipher  portrait  of  52, 53),  with  Shakespeare,  1616, 
and  also  with  Bacon,  whose  name  we  find  upon  page  53,  Merry 
Wives  of  Windsor,  267  or  268.  To  my  mind  nothing  could  be  more 
simple,  for  if  numbers  could  speak  they  here  say  :  '*  This  stage 
play  belonging  to  Shakespeare  belongs  to  Bacon  as  well. " 


This  268, 

53     ( 

r       Bacon    268     1 

) 

Stage'Zm 

< 

I         269 

>     p.  53,  M.  W.  W, 

Play  270 

{ 

{     warrant.  270     J 

> 

K^ng  H  E  .V  R  ^  the  Seventh, 


21 


education  j  or  in  fit  arifwcres  to  queftions,  or  the  like, 
any  wayes  to  come  nearc  the  refemblancc  of  him 
whom  he  was  to  reprefent.  For  this  Lad  was  not  to 
perfonate  one ,  that  had  beenc  long  before  taken  out 
of  his  Cradle,  or  conueighed  away  in  hisinfancie, 
knowne  to  few  -,  but  a  routh  thattill  the  age  almoft  of 
ten  yeares  had  beenc  brought  vp  in  a  Court  where 
infinite  eyes  had  beene  vpon  him.  For  King  Ed- 
ward touched  with  rcmorfc  of  his  brother  the 
Duke  of  Clarences  death ,  would  not  indeed  rcftorc 
his  fonnc,(of  whom  wee  fpcafec)  to  be  Dukeof  C/tt- 
rence^  but  yet  created  him  Ezrlcoi  PFarwich  ^teuu 
uing  his  honour  on  the  mothers  fide,  and  vfed  Wnti 
honourably  during  his  time  ,  though  Ri  chard 
the  Third  afterwards  confined  him.  So  that  it  can- 
not be,  but  that  fome  great  Per/on ,  that  knew  particu- 
:  larly,  and  familiarly  E  d  wa  r o  P  l  a  k  tj^  g  e  h  B  t^ 
had  a  hand  in  the  bufineflt^  from  whom  the  Prieft 
might  take  his  ayme*  That  which  is  moft  p robablc, 
outof  the  precedent  and  fubfcqucnt  Acts,is,thatit 
was  the  Qjieene  (Dowa^er^  from  whom  this  action  had 
the  principall  fourcc  and  motion*  'For  certainc  it 
is,flieewas  a  bufie negotiating  woman,  andin  her 
Vtthdrawing-ChAmber  had  the  fortunate  Qonjpiracie  for 
the  King  againft  King  Richard  the  Third, 
beenc  hatched;  which  the  King  knew,  and  temena- 
bred  perhaps  but  too  well  v  and  was  at  this  time  cx- 
treamely  difcontent  with  the  King  ,  thinking  her 
daughter(as  the  King  handled  the  matter^  not  aduah- 
cedjbutdcpreflTed:  and  none  could  hold  the&o^<r 
fo  well  to  prompt  and  inftruct  this  Stige-fUj  ^^s  ibe 
could,  ^^fcuerthdef^c  it  was  not  her  meaning ,  nor  no 
more  was  it  the  meaning  of  any  of  the  better  and  la- 
ger fort  that  fauoured  this  Enterprifc  and  knew  the 
Secret,  that  this  difguifcd  IdoU  fliould  poffcfTc  the 
Crownei  butat  hispcrill  lomakeway  to  the  Oiicii. 

throw 


^ng  He  NRr  the SeueAfb. 


n 


his  Efcapc^  the  cunning  Priefl  changed  hk  Copic,  ahd 
chofc  now  Pla  ntaoenet  to  be  the  Subic(5l  his 
Puinll  fliould  perfonate ,  becaufc  he  was  more  in  the 
prelenr  fpcech,  and  votes  of  the  people ;  and  it  pieced 
better,  and  followed  more  clofeand  handfomely.vp- 
on  the  bruit  ofPtANTAoENETs  efcapc.  But  yet 
doubting  that  there  would  be  too  necrc  looking,  and 
too  much  PeifpeSiiuemio  hisDifguifc,  if  he  {nould 
fhew  it  here  in  England ^  hee  ihoughc  good  (after  the 
manner  of  Seems  in  Stage-flaycs  and  Mashs)  to  flicW 
itafarreoff^  and  thertfore  faylcd  with  his  SchoUct 
into  Ireland^  where  the  Affcdion  to  the  Houfc  of 
Y  o  R  K  B  was  moft  in  height  The  King  had  bccne 
a  little  improuident  in  ch^  matters  odreiand,  and  had 
not  remoucd  Off'uen  and  Counfellorfi  and  put  in  theif 
places,  or  at  Icaft  inteimingled  perfons.  of  whom  hcd 
Uood  afTurcd.as  he  fhould  hauc  done,  fince hee  knew 
the  ftrong  Bent  of  that  GDuntrey  towards  the  Houfc 
of  Y  o  R  K  E  j  and  that  it  was  a  ticklifht  and  vnfctlcd  ■ 
Stare,  more  cafic  to  recciuc  diftcmpcrs  and  mutaci-  [ 
ens,  then  England  wsls.  But  trufting  to  the  reputation 
of  his  Vidorics  and  SuccefTcs  in  Enghnd^zt  thouj^hi 
hcc  (hould  haue  time  enough  to  cxtcnid  his  Cares  af- 
terwards to  that  fccond  Kingdodnc. 

Wherefore  through  this  neglcdl ,  vpon  the  com- 
ming  of  Simon  with  his  pretended  Pi  a  n  t  a- 
GENET  into  Ireland^  all  thioga  were  prepared  for 
Rcuolt  and  Sedition, almoft  as  if  thcyhad  becncfct 
and  plotted  before  bund.  Sii<MONS  firft  addrfcflfe 
was  to  the  Lord  Thoma©  Fitz-Ge^ard^ 
Earle  of  Kjldare^  and  Dcputie  of  Inland  :  beford 
whofc  Eyes  hee  did  call  fuchaMift  (by  bis  ownc 
infinuation,  and  by  the  carriage  of  his  Youdi,  kbat 
cxprefifcd  a  naturall  Princely  behauloLic)aaioyntd 
perhaps  with  fome  inward  Vapours  of  Anabitkm 
and  AfFcdion  in  the  Earlcs  ov^ibj  ]!nkidc»^(iefc  him 
1  fully 


CHAPTER  X. 

Cipher  Discoveries —  Continued. 

Daus  omnia  in  mensura,  et  numero,  et  ordino  disposuit.     {Motto  to  second  title  page 
Advancement  of  Learning,  p.  61,  16W.) 

I  believe  all  the  prefatory  pieces  attached  to  the  1623  folio  con- 
tain cipher  connections  going  to  prove  Bacon's  authorship  of  the 
plays.  I  have  introduced  a  fac-simile  of  one  which  is  worthy  of  note, 
signed  Hugh  Holland. 

This  poem  is  found  amongst  the  pieces  prefacing  the  1623  folio 
Shakespeare.    The  reader's  attention  is  called  to  the  line : 
"  Which  crowned  him  Poet  first,  then  Poet's  King. " 

If  we  count  the  words  up  from  the  bottom  of  the  poem,  it  is 
curious  to  find  this  result,  accordingly  as  we  count  tyring-house  as 
one  or  two  words : 

{Poet  55  or  56. 
first,  54  or  55. 
then  53  or  54. 
Poet's  52  or  53. 
King,  51  or  52. 

Now  Bacon's  two  ages  1616  were  55  and  56,  that  is,  he  was  55 
years  old,  and  in  his  56th  year.  Shakespeare  at  his  death  was  52 
years  old  and  in  his  53d  year.  (Stratford  monument.)  Is  this  coin- 
cidence only  ?  Is  it  not  possible  the  first  poet  (55,  56)  is  intended 
for  Bacon,  the  King  of  Poets  and  {poets),  King  of  Shakespeare 
(52,  53)?  The  word  tragedies  will  be  found  the  seventy-third  word 
down  and  the  fiftieth  or  forty-ninth  word  up  the  poem.  Upon  pages 
106,  107  {Advancement,  1640),  tragedies  and  stage  plays  are  dis- 
cussed; there  are  seventy-three  words  in  italics,  page  106  {Dramat- 
ical Poesy),  seventy-three  or  seventy-four  words  in  itaUcs,  page  107 
{Stage  Plays.) 

1  now  wish  to  draw  attention  to  page  23,  King  Henry  the^Sev- 
entWs  History,  by  Bacon,  which  is  even  a  more  important  page  than 
21.  This  page  has  already  been  discussed  in  my  last  work,  Francis 
Bacon,  but  as  there  are  some  further  points  I  should  like  to  illus- 
trate, I  reintroduce  it.  There  can  be  little  doubt  this  page  23,  like 
page  21;  is  in  cipher  touch  with  the  plays.    Indeed  I  am  convinced 

169 


170  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

the  whole  of  Bacon's  King  Henry  the  Seventh  was  expressly  written 
to  furnish  proof  of  his  authorship  of  the  1623  folio  plays.  As  I  have 
already  remarked  in  Francis  Bacon,  this  reign  is  the  one  which  is 
omitted  in  the  orderly  succession  of  the  chronicle  plays,  Richard  the 
Third  being  followed  by  the  play  of  King  Henry  the  Eighth.  No- 
body can  imagine  for  a  moment  this  reign  was  passed  over  on 
account  of  its  uninteresting  art  character.  On  the  contrary,  it  was 
full  of  events,  and  in  the  union  of  the  Eoses,  the  discovery  of  America, 
the  revival  of  the  classics,  furnished  abundant  material  for  art- 
Bacon  made  use  of  it,  I  submit,  to  illustrate  through  the  impostors 
Lambert  Simnel  and  Perkin  Warbeck  the  parallel  of  Shakes- 
peare with  regard  to  himself.  Henry  the  Seventh  was  chosen  as 
protector  to  the  Knights  of  Rhodes  (the  originals  of  the  Rosier u- 
cians),  and  in  his  private  life,  religious  character  and  succession  to 
a  bad  man  like  Richard  the  Third,  presented  Bacon  with  a  perfect 
analogy  to  represent  his  own  literary  succession  to  Shakespeare. 

The  date  of  the  first  folio  Shakespeare  plays  was  1623.  Bacon 
was  62  and  in  his  63d  year.  It  is  therefore  curious  to  find  these  words : 

Pa^e  23. 

History 

King  Henry  VII. 

Sixty-one  is  the  number  of  "  Disguise, "  {without  counting  the 
italic  and  capital  tvords  down  the  page).  The  reader  will  notice  a 
remarkable  thing, — if  we  add  the  paging  (23)  to  61  ("  Disguise  "  ),  we 
get  84,  the  number  of  ''  Stage, ''  (or  "  Stage  Plays  " ). 

\         his        60  plus  23  equals  83.     (  In  83. 

I    Disguise  61  plus  23  equals  84.    (    Stage  Plays  84. 

In  the  same  way,  if  we  add  the  paging  23  to  63  (Perspective) 
we  get  86  (Masques): 

Perspective  63  plus  23  equals  86,  Masques  86. 

In  the  sonnets  (ascribed  to  Shakespeare)  we  read  : 

Perspective  it  is  best  painter's  art. 

For  through  the  painter  must  you  see  his  skill. 

•  {Sonnet  xxiv.) 

Compare : 

Like  perspectives,  which  rightly  gazed  upon 
Show  nothing  but  confusion,  eyed  awry 
Distinguish  form. 

{Richard  11. ,  act  ii.  2.) 


Too 

61. 

' 

Much 

58,  62. 

Scejies 

82. 

Perspective 

63. 

in 

83. 

into 

59,  64. 

Sta^e  Plays 

84  and  85. 

his 

60,  65. 

and 

85  or  86. 

Disguise 

61,  66. 

Masques 

86  or  87 

THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  171 

Bacon  writes  : 

''  Like  perspectives  which  show  things  inward,  when  they  are  but 
paintings." — [Natural  History.) 

One  of  Bacon's  deficients  of  ^  New  World  of  Sciences  is  entitled 
Kadix  Perspective,  or  the  Original  of  the  Perspectives,  and  is  con- 
nected with  the  Novum  Organum.  I  am  convinced  it  deals  with 
the  cipher  problem  in  its  radical  and  initiative  form. 

What  we  just  want  is  the  right  perspective  of  the  authorship  of 
the  plays,  as  to  the  disguise  of  the  real  poet,  behind  the  Shakespeare 
mask.  My  theories  and  manipulating  the  numbers  may  be  termed, 
perhaps,  ingenious,  but  I  am  convinced,  from  a  vast  mass  of  such 
particulars,  that  ages  and  dates  are  prime  factors,  and  root  cipher 
steps  in  this  problem.  The  italicizing  of  words,  or  the  "  accent  of 
words  (as  Bacon  terms  it,  page  264,  Advancement  of  Learning), 
form  part  of  the  cipher  scheme.  The  words  of  every  suspicious  page 
must  be  counted  with  and  without  the  italicized  or  accented  words,  and 
also  in  relationship  to  the  paging.  What  more  likely  than  upon  page 
23,  standing  for  1623  (just  as  92  stands  for  1892),  Bacon  should 
introduce  Stage  Plays  ±i^d  Masks  ?  Or  what  more  ingenious  than 
to  identify  his  own  Perspective  (as  disguise)  with  his  own  age  in 
1623,  that  is,  62,  63  ? 

Too  61. 

Much  62. 

Perspective  63. 

The  reader  will  notice,  if  we  add  the  paging  23,  to  the  numbers 
83,  84  (against  In  Stage  Plays),  we  get  106,  107.  It  is  upon  column 
106,  page  53,  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  the  word  Bacon  occurs,  and 
Francis  (Bacon's  Christian  name)  is  entered  twenty-one  times  upon 
column  107  of  the  Histories,  page  56  (really  54,  page  47  First  King 
Henry  IV.  is  mispaged  49). 

If  we  deduct  the  paging  number  23  from  the  numbers  against 
Stage  Plays  and  Masques,  it  is  very  remarkable  to  find  we  get  61, 
62,  63  or  62,  63,  64, —  two  of  these  figures  (in  each  possible  count) 
being  Bacon's  age. 

C  Stage  Plays  84  —  23  =  61 ;  or  85  —  23  =  62. 
<and  85  —  23  =  62;  or  86  —  23  =  63. 

i^Masqites       86  —  23  =  63;  or  87  —  23  =  64. 

These  hyphenated  words  seem  to  embarrass  the  counts,  but  I 
am  convinced  they  are  introduced  with  a  profound  purpose.  For 
example,  it  may  be  seen  this  is  the  only  possible  method  by  which 
the  same  numbers  62,  63,  can  be  both  brought  to  bear  upon  two 


172  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

words,— '^  Stage  Pla7/s  and  Masques,  ^^  separated  by  a  word  {and). 
If  we  collate  the  passages  by  figures  we  get  this  congruity : 

CToo  61.  CSt(we  Plays   61. 

<Much  62.  ^and  62. 

(^Perspective    63.  (^Masques         63. 

By  perspective  Bacon  means  things  seen  at  a  distance. 

It  may  be  perceived  how  very  apposite  this  introduction  of  Stage 
Plays  and  Masks  was  to  Bacon's  own  relationship  to  Shakespeare, 
inasmuch  as  all  this  is  introduced  with  regard  to  the  impostor  Lam- 
bert SiMNEL,  who  was  personating  Richard,  Duke  of  York,  sec- 
ond son  to  King  Edward  the  Fourth.  Simnel  was  setting  himself 
up  falsely,  after  the  manner  of  an  actor,  to  be  the  rightful  King, 
whereas  he  had  no  right  or  real  claim.  Bacon  terms  him,  *'  this  dis- 
guised idol," — ''the  counterfeit  Plantageuet, " — "an  airy  body  or 
phantasm."  I  am  convinced  he  has  been  selected  as  a  hint  for 
Shakespeare  by  analogy.  This  may  appear  a  far-fetched  theory. 
But  inasmuch  as  Bacon  could  not  write  Shakespeare  without  discov- 
ery, what  other  course  was  open  to  him,  except  to  select  parallels  of 
counterfeit  impostors,  and  apply  them  by  ciphers  to  his  own  case  ? 
But  there  is  text  proof,  Bacon  has  made  use  of  Lambeet  Simnel 
in  this  History  of  King  Henry  the  Seventh  to  establish  par- 
allels for  Shakespeare  as  an  impostor  poet.  Upon  page  126  Bacon 
gives  us  Doctor  Warham's  speech  upon  Perkin  Warbeck.  Upon 
pages  127,  128  we  read : 

"  But  (my  Lords)  I  labor  too  much  in  a  clear  (page  128)  busi- 
ness. The  King  is  so  wise,  and  hath  so  good  friends  abroad,  as  now 
he  knoweth  Duke  Perkin  from  his  cradle.  And  because  he  is  a 
great  Prince,  if  you  have  any  good  Poet  here,  he  can  help  him  with 
Notes  to  write  his  life;  and  to  parallel  Mm  with  Lambert  Simnel j 
now  the  King's  Falconer."  (1st  edition,  1622.) 

The  words  Lambert  Simnel  are  the  fifty-first  and  fifty-second 
words  counted  down  from  the  top  of  the  page.  Upon  page  20, 
Bacon  writes  of  Richard  Simon  (who  got  up  the  plot  of  personating 
Lambert  Simnel  as  the  heir  to  the  throne), — "That  this  Priest  — 
should  think  it  possible  for  him  to  instruct  his  '  Player,^  "  etc. 
Shakespeare  was  an  actor  or  player,  and  his  arms  were  a  Falcon. 

Upon  page  112,  Lambert  Simnel  and  Perkin  Warbeck  are  intro- 
duced in  these  words : 

"  At  this  time  the  King  began  again  to  be  haunted  with  sprites, 
by  the  Magic  and  curious  arts  of  the  Lady  Margaret,  who  raised  up 
the  ghost  of  Richard,  Duke  of  York,  second  son  to  King  Edward 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEMATUBE,  173 

the  Fourth,  to  walk  and  vex  the  King.  This  was  a  finer  counter- 
feit stone,  than  Lambert  Simnel;  better  done  and  worn  upon 
greater  hands ;  being  graced  after,  with  the  wearing  of  a  King  of 
France,  and  a  King  of  Scotland,  not  a  Duchess  of  Burgundy  only. 
And  for  Simnel,  there  was  not  much  in  him,  more  than  that  (page 
113)  he  was  a  handsome  hoy  and  did  not  shame  his  robes.  But  this 
youth  (of  whom  we  are  now  to  speak)  was  such  a  Mercurial,  as  the 
lilvc  hath  seldom  been  known,  and  could  make  his  own  past,  if  at 
any  time  he  chanced  to  be  out.  Wherefore  this  being  one  of  the 
strangest  Examples  of  a  Personation  that  ever  teas  in  elder  or  later 
times;  it  deserveth  to  be  discovered  and  related  at  the  full.  Al- 
though the  King's  manner  of  showing  things,  by  pieces  and  dark 
lights,  hath  so  muffled  it,  that  it  hath  left  it  almost  as  a  mystery  to 
this  day."   (Page  113,  History  King  Henry  VII.,  Bacon,  1622.) 

If  the  first  paragraph  is  counted  from  Lambert  will  be  found  the 
fifty-third  word.  If,  from  the  top  of  page  113,  the  words  are  counted 
down,  we  find  this  up  and  down  the  page : 

Wherefore  268. 

this  267. 

being  266. 

One  51  —  265. 

Page  113,  of  52  —  264. 

Histonj  \   the  53  —  263. 

King  Henry  VII.,  Strangest  54  —  262. 

1622.  Examples  55  —  261. 

of  56  —  260. 

a  57  —  259. 

,  Personation  58  —  258. 

It  may  be  seen  the  words  the  strangest  examples  are  the  fifty- 
third,  fifty-fourth,  fifty-fifth  words,  embracing  Shakespeare's  age 
(53)  and  Bacon's  (55),  1616.  Moreover,  the  words,  '•  wherefore  this^^ 
are  the  267th,  268th  up  the  page,  in  congruence  with  the  number 
of  the  words,  *'  For  Bacon' ^  upon  page  53,  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor. 

The  name  Lambert  Slmnel  will  be  found  (repeatedly)  to  be  the 
eighty-fifth  and  eighty-fourth  words  all  counted  down  and  up  the 
following  pages : 

Bacon's         f  ^^S^  20,  Lambert  Simnel,  84,  85,  down  the  page. 
K  H  VII       i  Page  113,  Lambert  Simnel,  84,  85,  up  the  page. 
to+  A-iif    i«9o    1  Page  114,  Lambert  Simnel,  87  or  85,  up  the  page. 
1st  edit.,  \bii.   I^p^gg  J25.  Perkin,  52  up  the  page. 

Moreover,  in  terming  Lambert  Simnel  a  disguised  idol,  we  have  a 
hint  for  Bacon's  idols  of  the  theatre. 

The  tabled  page  264,  from  the  Advancement  of  Learning  of  1640. 
may  be  tested  as  to  correctness  of  printed  matter,  by  reference  to 
Mr.  F.  J.  Schulte,  of  298  Dearborn  Street,  Chicago,  who  possesses  a 
copy  of  the  said  work.    The  expense  connected  with  fac-simile  repro- 


174 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITER ATUBE. 


(luctions  has  preveoted  my  giving  the  page  in  original.  I  may  here 
observe  for  those  persons  who  imagine  they  may  anticipate  me  by 
means  of  my  own  labors,  this  page  264  has  already  been  discussed  in 
Hermes  Stella,  and,  therefore,  this  cannot  be  discounted. 

308 
307 
306 
305 
304 
303 
302 
301 
300 
299 
298 
297 
296 
295 
294 
293 
292 
291 
290 
299 
288 
287 
286 
285 
284 
283 
282 
281 
280 
279 
278 
277 
276 
275 
274 
273 
272 
271 
270 
269 
268 
267 
266 
265 
264 


Fables 

1 

146 

352 

or 

2 

145 

351 

Metre 

3 

144 

350 

it 

4 

143 

349 

is, 

5 

142 

348 

as 

6 

141 

347 

we 

7 

140 

346 

have 

8 

139 

345 

said 

9 

138 

344 

before, 

10 

137 

343 

as 

11 

136 

342 

a 

12 

135 

341 

Luxuriant 

13 

134 

340 

herb 

14 

133 

339 

brought 

15 

132 

338 

forth 

16 

131 

337 

without 

17 

130 

336 

seed, 

18 

129 

335 

and 

19 

128 

334 

springs 

20 

127 

333 

up 

21 

126 

332 

from 

22 

125 

331 

the 

23 

124 

330 

strength 

24 

123 

329 

and 

25 

122 

328 

rankness 

26 

121 

327 

of 

27 

120 

326 

the 

28 

119 

325 

soil. 

29 

118 

324 

Wherefore 

30 

117 

323 

it 

31 

116 

322 

runs 

32 

115 

321 

along 

33 

114 

320 

every 

34 

113 

319 

where. 

35 

317 

and 

36 

112 

is 

37 

111 

316 

so 

38 

110 

315 

amply 

39 

109 

314 

spread, 

40 

108 

313 

as 

41 

41 

107 

312 

it 

42 

42 

106 

311 

were 

43 

43 

105 

310 

a 

44 

44 

104 

309 

superfluous 

45 

45 

103 

labour 

46 

46 

102 

to 

47 

47 

101 

be 

48 

48 

100 

curious 

49 

49 

99 

of 

50 

50 

98 

any 

51 

51 

97 

Deficients 

52 

96 

therein; 

52 

53 

95 

The 

54 

care 

55 

therefore 

56 

for 

57 

this 

58 

is 

59 

already 

60 

taken. 

61 

As 

53 

62 

94 

for 

54 

63 

93 

Accents 

55 

64 

92 

of 

56 

65 

91 

Words, 

57 

66 

90 

there 

67 

is 

68 

no 

69 

need, 

70 

that 

71 

we 

72 

speak 

73 

of 

74 

so 

75 

small 

76 

a 

77 

matter; 

78 

unless 

79 

perchance. 

80 

some 

81 

may 

82 

think 

83 

it 

84 

worth 

85 

the 

86 

noting. 

87 

that 

88 

there 

89 

THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE, 


175 


hath 

90 

263 

been 

91 

262 

exact 

92 

261 

observation 

93 

260 

made 

94 

259 

of 

95 

258 

the 

96 

257 

Accents 

58 

97 

89 

256 

of 

59 

98 

88 

255 

Words, 

60 

99 

87 

254 

but 

100 

253 

not 

101 

252 

of 

102 

251 

the 

103 

250 

Accents 

61 

104 

86 

249 

of 

62 

105 

85 

248 

Sentences; 

63 

106 

84 

247 

yet, 

107 

246 

this, 

108 

245 

for 

109 

244 

most 

110 

243 

part 

111 

242 

is 

112 

241 

the 

113 

240 

general 

114 

239 

custom 

115 

238 

of 

116 

237 

all 

117 

236 

men, 

118 

235 

that 

119 

234 

in 

120 

233 

the 

121 

232 

close 

122 

231 

of 

123 

230 

a 

124 

229 

Period 

125 

228 

they 

126 

227 

let 

127 

226 

fall 

128 

225 

their 

129 

224 

voice, 

130 

223 

in 

131 

222 

a 

132 

221 

demand 

133 

220 

they 

134 

219 

raise 

135 

218 

it 

136 

217 

and 

137 

216 

many 

138 

215 

such 

139 

214 

like 

140 

usages. 

141 

As 

64 

142 

83 

for 

65 

143 

82 

Writing, 

66 

144 

81 

that 

145 

is 

146 

performed 

147 

either 

148 

by 

149 

the 

150 

vulgar 

151 

Alphabet, 

152 

which 

153 

is 

154 

every 

155 

where 

156 

received 

157 

or 

158 

by 

159 

a 

160 

secret 

161 

and 

162 

private 

163 

Alphabet 

164 

which 

165 

men 

166 

agree 

167 

upon 

168 

between 

169 

themselves, 

170 

which 

171 

they 

172 

call 

173 

Cyph  ers. 

67 

174 

80 

But 

175 

the 

176 

vulgar 

68 

177 

79 

Orthography 

69 

178 

78 

hath 

179 

brought 

180 

forth 

181 

unto 

182 

us 

183 

a 

184 

Controversy, 

185 

and 

186 

question, 

187 

namely, 

188 

Whether 

70 

189 

771 

213 
212 
211 
210 
209 
208 
207 
206 
205 
204 
203 
202 
201 
200 
199 
198 
197 
196 
195 
194 
193 
192 
191 
190 
189 
188 
187 
186 
185 
184 
183 
182 
181 
180 
179 
178 
177 
176 
175 
174 
173 
172 
171 
170 
169 
168 
167 
166 
165 
164 


17S 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 


Words 

71 

190 

76 

163 

should 

72 

191 

75 

162 

be 

73 

192 

74 

161 

written 

74 

193 

73 

160 

as 

75 

194 

72 

159 

they 

76 

195 

71 

158 

are 

77 

196 

70 

157 

spoken, 

78 

197 

69 

156 

or 

79 

198 

68 

155 

rather 

80 

199 

67 

154 

after 

81 

200 

66 

153 

the 

$2 

201 

65 

152 

usual 

$3 

202 

64 

151 

manner. 

84 

203 

63 

150 

But 

204 

149 

this 

205 

148 

kind 

206 

147 

of 

207 

146 

writing 

208 

145 

which 

209 

144 

seems 

210 

143 

to 

211 

142 

be 

212 

141 

reformed, 

213 

140 

which 

214 

139 

is, 

215 

138 

that 

85 

216 

62 

137 

writing 

86 

217 

61 

136 

should 

87 

218 

60 

135 

he 

88 

219 

59 

134 

consonant 

89 

220 

58 

133 

to 

90 

221 

57 

132 

speaking. 

91 

222 

56 

131 

is 

223 

130 

a 

224 

129 

branch 

225 

128 

of 

226 

127 

unprofitable 

227 

126 

subtleties; 

228 

125 

for 

229 

124 

oronunciation 

92 

230 

55 

123 

it 

231 

122 

self 

232 

121 

every- 

233 

120 

day 

234 

119 

increases 

235 

118 

and 

236 

117 

alters 

237 

116 

the 

238 

115 

fashion; 

239 

114 

and 

240 

the 

241 

derivation 

242 

of 

243 

words, 

244 

especially 

245 

from 

246 

foreign 

247 

languages. 

248 

are 

249 

utterly 

250 

defaced 

251 

and 

252 

extinguisht. 

253 

In 

254 

brief, 

2^5 

seeing 

256 

writing, 

93 

257 

54 

according 

258 

to 

259 

the 

260 

received 

261 

custom. 

262 

doth 

263 

no 

264 

way 

265 

prejudice 

266 

the 

267 

manner 

94 

268 

53 

of 

95 

269 

52 

speaking, 

96 

270 

51 

to 

271 

what 

272 

end 

273 

should 

274 

this 

275 

innovation 

276 

be 

277 

brought 

278 

in? 

279 

Wherefore 

97 

280 

50 

let 

98 

281 

49 

us 

99 

282 

48 

come 

100 

283 

47 

to 

101 

284 

46 

Cyphers 

285 

Their 

286 

kinds 

287 

are 

288 

many, 

289 

113 

112 

HI 

110 

109 

108 

107 

106 

105 

104 

103 

102 

101 

100 

99 

98 

97 

96 

95 

94 

93 

92 

91 

90 

89 

88 

87 

86 

85 

84 

83 

82 

81 

80 

79 

78 

77 

76 

75 

74 

73 

72 

71 

70 

69 

68 

67 

66 

65 

64 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 


177 


as 

Cyphers 

Simple; 

Cyphers 

intermixt 

with 
NulloeSj 
or 
non- 
significant 
characters; 
Cyphers 

of 

double 

letters 

under 

one 

character; 

Wheel 
Cyphers; 

Key 
Cyphers; 
Cyphers 

of 

Words; 

others 

But 

the 

virtues 

of 

them 

whereby 


290 

63 

102 

291 

45 

62 

103 

292 

44 

61 

104 

293 

43 

60 

105 

294 

42 

59 

106 

295 

41 

58 

107 

296 

40 

57 

297 

56 

298 

55 

299 

54 

300 

53 

103 

301 

39 

52 

109 

302 

38 

51 

110 

303 

37 

50 

111 

304 

36 

49 

112 

305 

35 

48 

113 

306 

34 

47 

114 

307 

33 

46 

115 

308 

32 

45 

116 

309 

3L 

44 

117 

310 

30 

43 

118 

311 

29 

42 

119 

312 

28 

41 

120 

313 

27 

40 

121 

314 

26 

39 

122 

315 

25 

38 

316 

37 

317 

36 

318 

35 

319 

34 

320 

33 

321 

32 

they 

322 

31 

are 

323 

30 

to 

324 

29 

be 

325 

28 

preferred 

326 

27 

are 

327 

26 

three; 

328 

25 

That 

123 

329 

24 

24 

they 

124 

330 

23 

23 

be 

125 

3il 

22 

22 

ready, 

126 

332 

21 

21 

and 

127 

333 

20 

20 

not 

128 

334 

19 

19 

laborious 

129 

335 

18 

18 

to 

130 

336 

17 

17 

write; 

131 

337 

16 

16 

that 

132 

338 

15 

15 

they 

133 

339 

14 

14 

be 

134 

340 

13 

13 

sure. 

135 

341 

12 

12 

and 

136 

342 

11 

11 

lie 

137 

343 

10 

10 

not 

138 

344 

9 

9 

open 

139 

345 

8 

8 

to 

140 

346 

7 

7 

Deciphering; 

141 

347 

6 

6 

And 

142 

348 

5 

5 

lastly 

143 

349 

4 

4 

if 

144 

350 

3 

3 

it 

145 

351 

2 

2 

be 

146 

352 

1 

1 

I  now  come  to  the  really  striking  and  fairly  astonishing 
grouping,  or  congruity  of  figures,  touching  the  "  Maxner  of 
Speaking,"  by  means  of  ciphers,  wherein  Bacon  evidently  gives 
us  the  mathematical  method,  and  its  relationship  of  paging,  by 
which  he  speaks.  I  have  tabled  this  page  on  aqcount  of  its  impor- 
tance ;  that  is,  the  first  column  deals  with  the  italicized  words  only, 
counted  down.  The  second  column  deals  with  the  words  altogether, 
or  indiscriminately,  counted  down  the  page.  The  third  and  fourth 
columns  repeat  this  double  process  up  the  page,  and  thus  the  only 
four  possible  counts  are  exhausted : 


up  the  page. 


Every-where — 

The 

■)    266  or  267 

' 

86 

Counted   first   singly, 

Manner 

267        268 

53 

85 

then   doubly,  down 

of 

268        269  • 

52 

84 

the  page. 

^      Speaking. 

J    269        270 

51 

83 

12 

178  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

Here  are  all  our  old  friends  of  page  53,  M.  W.  of  Windsor  (col.  106), 
against  each  other, — the  paging  53  and  the  number^  267 or  268,  which 
we  have  found  to  be  the  number  of  the  word  Bacon,  according  as  we 
count  Hang -Hog  singly  or  doubly  !  The  reader  will  also  recognize 
in  the  last  column  (the  last  column  counted  up  the  page),  the  same 
numbers  already  found  upon  page  23  Bacon^s  History  of  King  Henry 
the  Seventh  (1622) : 

In  ]      83 

^Xli^''        mZm  (s^^eP^^,  two  words., 

Masques.        j      86  or  87 

If  numbers,  by  congruity,  can  speak,  they  tell  us  Bacon's  method 
of  speaking  hy  cipher  numbers,  in  Stage-Plays  and  Masques,  is  to  be 
found  on  pages  51,  52,  53  of  the  comedies  and  histories,  upon  which 
pages  we  do  actually  find  the  word  Bacon  four  times,  viz. :  page  51, 
1st  K.  H.  IV.,  mispaged  (from  false  49)  53.  Page  52  (mispaged  54) 
twice,  page  53,  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor  : 

{53  false)  page  51,  1st  K.  H.  IV.     Gammon  of  Bacon  (369,  370,  371). 
(54/aZ5e)  page  52,  1st  JT.  ^. /F.     "  0;i  Bacon's,  on,"   ^' JBacon  fed  Knaves^^ 

(158,  198). 
53  (correct)  p.  53,  Merry  Wives  of  W.    Bacon  I  warrant  (267  oi*  268). 

These  are  the  only  four  entries  of  the  word  Bacon  in  the  plays. 

THE   TAROT   OY  THE   BOHEMIANS. 

It  seems  there  is  very  little  doubt  the  Rosicrucians  were  in  pos- 
session of  the  real  Tarot,  as  is  proved  by  a  book  of  St.  Martin,  where 
the  divisions  are  those  of  the  Tarot,  and  this  passage  of  an  enemy  of 
the  Rosicrucians : 

"  They  claim  to  possess  a  volume,  wherein  they  can  learn,  all  that  is 
to  be  found  in  other  books,  which  now  are,  or  which  can  even  come  into 
existence.  This  volume  is  their  own  reason,  in  which  they  find  the 
prototype  of  all  that  subsists  by  their  facility  in  analyzing,  summa- 
rising, and  creating  a  kind-  of  intellectual  world,  and  of  all  pos- 
sible beings.  See  the  philosophical,  theosophical  and  microsmic 
cards."  {Conspiracy  against  the  Catholic  Religion  and  against 
Crowned  Heads.  By  the  author  of  The  Veil  raised  for  the  Curious. 
Paris:  Crapard,  1792.) 

This  is  highly  probable,  if  not  almost  certain,  because  in  the 
celebrated  Rosicrucian  manifesto  of  1614, — TJie  Fama  Fraternitatis, 
— we  find  repeated  mention  of  a  work  called  Rota  Mundi. 

"  Yet  there  came  into  our  memory  a  secret,  which,  through  dark 
and  hidden  words  and  speeches  of  the  hundred  years.  Brother  A.,  the 
successor  of  D.  (who  was  of  the  last  and  second  row  of  succession, 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE.  179 

and  had  lived  amongst  many  of  us),  did  impart  unto  us  of  the  third 
row  and"  succession;  otherwise  we  must  confess,  that  after  the  death 
of  the  said  A.,  none  of  us  had  in  any  manner  known  anything  of 
Brother  C.  E.,  and  of  his  first  fellow-brethren,  then  that  whicli  was 
extant  of  them  in  our  philosophical  Bibliotheca,  amongst  which 
our  Axiom  ATA  was  held  for  the  chiefest,  RotaAIunde  for  the  most 
artificial,  and  Protheus  for  the  most  profitable." 

(p.  75,  Wane's  Beal  History  of  the  Bosicrucians.) 
*'  Although  we  do  now  freely  confess  that  the  world  is  much 
amended  within  an  hundred  years,  yet  we  are  assured  that  our 
Axiomata  shall  unmovably  remain  unto  the  world's  end,  and  also  the 
world  in  the  highest  and  last  age  shall  not  attain  to  see  anything 
else ;  for  our  Rota  takes  the  beginning  from  that  day  when  God 
spake  Fiat,  and  shall  end  when  he  speakes  Pereat  "  (  p.  72,  Fama 
Fraternitatis. ) 

This  is  exactly  what  the  Tarot  claims  to  be, — of  unknown  pre- 
historic antiquity  dating  back  to  creation.  According  to  Eliphas 
Levi  and  William  Postel,  this  book,  which  is  called  the  Genesis  of 
Enoch,  is  anterior  to  the  Bible;  for,  on  the  ring  of  his  symbolic  key, 
he  reads  the  words  Rota,  Tarot;  Tora,  the  last  being  the  sacramental 
name  which  the  Jews  give  to  their  sacred  book. 

T 


B 

In  fact  this  is  the  Tora  of  EzekieVs  Wheel, — which,  according  to 
Postel,  is  the  key  of  things  hidden  from  the  beginning  of  the  world. 
William  Postel  was,  like  Paracelsus,  a  forerunner  and  anticipator  of 
the  Rosicrucians  of  the  Seventeenth  Century.  He  preached  the 
same  promise  of  the  restoration  and  reformation  of  things  of  the 
world,  with  prophecies  of  an  Elias  about  to  appear.  The  Rosicru- 
cians borrowed  their  origin  from  the  Templars  and  particularly  Con- 
stantine's  motto,  In  hoc  signo  vinces,  and  Cygnaeus  tells  us  so  directly. 
The  word  Tarot  is  composed  of  the  sacred  letters  of  the  monogram 
of  Constantine, —  A  Greek  P,  crossed  by  a  T,  between  the  Alpha  and 
Omega,  the  beginning  and  the  end.     Ehphas  Levi  calls  the  Tarot 


180  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEM ATUBE, 

the  veritable  key  of  Solomon.  Postel  dedicated  his  work  upon  it  to 
the  Fathers  of  the  Council  of  Trent,  by  the  title  —  "  Clavis  abscond- 
itorium,  a  constitutione  Mundi,^'  key  of  things  kept  secret  from  the 
foundation  of  the  world. 

There  is  very  little  doubt  this  Tarot  was  used  in  some  way  as  a 
secret  cipher.  For,  in  a  work  of  the  celebrated  Doctor  Dee,  titled 
"  A  True  and  Faithful  Belation  of  what  passed  for  many  years  be- 
tween Doctor  John  Dee  (a  mathematician  of  great  fame  in  Queen 
Ehzabeth's  and  King  James'  reigns)  and  some  Spirits^''  (1G59), 
I  find  in  a  great  square  table  (full  of  the  letters  of  the  alphabet 
and  numbers,  with  forty-nine  characters  each  way  and  thirty-five 
letters,)  each  corner  filled  with  a  little  numerical  square  of  seven 
ciphers  each  way,  making  the  sum  of  the  square  (7x7  =49)  equal 
to  the  length  of  the  sides  of  the  great  Square.  It  is  entitled  ''  A 
Specimen  of  the  Tables  or  Book  of  Enoch. ''  Doctor  Dee  iu  1583  left 
England  and  took  up  his  headquarters  in  1585  at  Prague,  then  the 
metropolis'  of  alchemy,  and  the  headquarters  of  adepts  and  adept- 
ship.  Now,  it  is  very  curious  to  find  Bohemia  the  land  where  the 
Tarot  particularly  has  survived.  In  fact,  Eliphas  Levi  asks  if 
the  Tarot  of  the  Bohemians  be  not  the  Genesis  of  Enoch  ?  The 
Taro  really  (means  Bota,  or  Wheel  of  Destiny)  is  an  elaborate  system 
of  divination  in  one  of  its  aspects,  and  a  process  of  mental  and 
spiritual  evolution  in  another.  Our  common  cards  are  but  imper- 
fect or  degenerated  sets  derived  from  the  original  Taro.  Like- 
wise fortune-telling  by  cards,  is  a  relic  of  the  original  system 
which  the  Gypsy  tribes j — particularly  of  Bohemia, —  possessed  and 
handed  over  by  tradition.  Diamonds  were  symbolized  by  the  Rose. 
It  is  worthy  to  note  Bohemia  is  introduced  in  that  profound  play 
The  Winter^s  Tale. 

"  The  ancient  sages  divided  the  perfect  panoramic  picture  of  the 
Taro,  into  a  number  of  tablets  solely  as  a  means  of  convenience  and 
practical  utihty  in  the  presentation  of  truth.  They  made  the 
symbolical  hieroglyphics  of  each  tablet  or  card,  correspond  in  its 
symbolism,  to  the  esoteric  significance  and  meaning  of  one  page  or  leaf 
of  the  sacred  book  of  Enoch,  the  perfect  man,  who  occupies  the  point 
of  equilibrium  in  the  celestial  sphere.  The  first  set  of  tablets  con- 
tain fifty-six  cards  and  in  twenty-two  keys,  or  seventy-eight  in  all. 

"  Down  the  spiral  course  of  time  there  has  come  to  us  the  tradi- 
tions of  a  primitive  book.  Its  symbols  in  later  days  furnished,  to 
writing  its  letters,  to  geometry  its  lines,  and  to  occult  philosophy, 
its  mysterious  signs  and  pentacles.    Anciently  it  was  known  as  the 

SACRED    BOOK    OF  ENOCH;    LATER   IT    HAS    BEEN    ENTITLED    THE 

TARO.    Its  authorship  as  well  as  its  date  are  both  lost  in  the  night 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  181 

of  time,  but  vestiges  of  it  are  to  be  found  in  the  lore  of  peoples. 
Tradition  says  that  tbe  original  book  consisted  of  detached  plates 
or  leaves,  of  fine  gold,  whereon  were  engraved  its  mysteries,  which 
remind  us  of  the  ^teraphim'  or  golden  images  of  Labau."  (The 
Taro,  by  T.  H.  Burgoyne.     The  Platonist,  August,  1887.) 

Papus,  in  his  Tarot  of  the  Bohemians,  writes : 

"  The  Mysterious  Fraternity  of  the  Eosicrucians  (1604)  LaFama 
Fraternitatis  Rosce  Crucis  (1613)  shows  the  initiate  that  the  Eosi- 
crucians possessed  the  Tarot,  which  is  described  thus:  '  Thet/ pos- 
sess a  book  from  which  they  can  learn  everything  that  is  in  the  books 
already  ivritten  and  to  be  written.^  " 

"  We  must  not  forget  that  the  Eosicrucians  are  the  Initiators  of 
Leibnitz,  and  the  founders  of  actual  Free-Masonry  through  Ash- 
mole."  (p.  298). 

"  Guillaume  Postel  was  one  of  the  greatest  initiates  of  the  Six- 
teenth Century.  He  discovered  the  key  to  the  Tarot,  but  did  not 
disclose  the  secret,  in  spite  of  the  promise  given  in  the  title  to  his 
work.  The  Key  to  the  Hidden  Mysteries^''  (1580).    (lb.) 

Now  it  is  very  striking  to  find  Bacon  in  his  History  of  Life  and 
Death  (which  note  is  on  all  fours  with  the  History  of  Life  and 
Death,  written  by  the  great  English  Eosicrucian,  Eobert  Fludd)  in- 
troducing Postel  thus : 

"  In  our  age  William  Postel,  a  Frenchman  lived  to  an  hundred 
and  well-nigh  twenty  years.  The  top  of  his  beard  on  the  upper  lip, 
being  black  and  not  grey  at  all.  A  great  traveler,  mathematician, 
and  somewhat  stained  with  heresy."  (Ex.  19,  p.  20,  History  of 
Life  and  Death,  1658.) 

I  am  very  strongly  inclined  to  the  belief  Bacon  has  employed  the 
Eota  and  the  Tarot  in  his  cipher.  There  are  seventy-eight  num- 
bers or  cards  in  the  Tarot.  Papus,  in  his  recently  published  and 
profound  work  upon  The  Tarot  of  the  Bohemians,  writes : 

"  The  Tarot  pack  is  composed  of  seventy-eight  cards  or  plates; 
twenty- two  of  them  bear  symbolical  names,  and  they  should  be 
separated  from  the  fifty-six  others,  which  are  divided  into  four 
great  series:  Scepters,  Cups,  Swords  and  Pentacles.  The  twenty- 
two  symbolical  cards  are  the  Major  Arcana  (Greater  Secrets), — the 
Minor  Arcana  (or  Lesser  Secrets)  are  formed  of  fifty-six  cards." 
(page  307,  Paris,  1889.) 

Upon  page  51  he  writes : 

"  There  are  twenty-two  Major  Arcana,  but  one  of  them  bears  an 
0,  so  that  in  reality  there  are  only  twenty- one  Great  or  Major 
Arcana. " 


182  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

The  reader  is  begged  to  keep  all  this  in  mind,  because  I  am 
going  to  point  out,  Bacon  is  fond  of  mispaging  with  the  number 
21,  and  it  is  upon  page  21,  History/  of  King  Henri/  the  Seventh,  the 
words  "  Stage  Plays  and  Masques  "  are  found  as  already  adduced. 
Upon  page  78  {mark,  this  is  the  number  of  the  entire  Tarot)  of  Lord 
Bacon's  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640,  there  is  the  following  mys- 
terious and  enigmatical  passage  relating  to  Distribution,  and  what  he 
terms  "  the  Originals  of  Intellectuals,"  in  relation  to  Beason, 
Memory  and  Imagination  (the  three  foundations  of  his  Instaura- 
tion),  and  also  in  relation  to  philosophy.  The  entire  passage  is  as 
dark  as  Erebus,  with  the  exception  Bacon  challenges  us  to  examine 
the  distribution  of  his  work  as  "  truly  made,^^  and  this  is  to  be  dis- 
covered by  recourse  to  the  *'  originals  of  intellectuals  " 
(p.  78).  What  are,  these  originals  of  intellectuals?  It  is 
remarkable  this  passage  follows  the  proem  of  the  second  book,  and 
is  entitled  Cap.  I.,  which  chapter  is  entirely  devoted  to  expla- 
nation of  the  three  bases  or  foundations,  History,  Poesy,  Philoso- 
phy, upon  which  the  Advancement,  if  not  the  entire  Instauration 
is  grounded.  The  passage  I  now  cite  is  brought  under  philosophy  or 
reason, —  "  abstract  notions, ^^  Bacon  terms  them: 

"  Philosopjiy  dismisseth  individuals  and  comprehendeth  not  the 
first  impressions,  but  the  abstract  notions  thereof,  and  conversant 
in  compounding  and  dividing  them,  according  to  the  law  of  nature 
and  of  the  things  themselves.  And  this  is  wholly  the  oflSce  and 
operation  of  reason. 

'*  And  that  this  distribution  is  truly  made,  he  shall  easily  con- 
ceive, that  hath  resource  to  the  originals  of  intellectuals." 
(p.  78.) 

By  compounding  and  dividing.  Bacon  is  giving  us,  seemingly,  a 
hint  for  mathematics. 

In  Bacon's  New  Atlantis  (seventh  edition,  1658),  page  13  is  mis- 
paged  21.  It  concludes  page  34.  Upon  the  next  page  is  a  loose 
leaf  entitled  '^Magnalia  Naturae,  praecipue  quoad  usus  Humanos. " 
This  is  paged  21  (instead  of  35,  the  right  and  sequent  number  to  34, 
the  previous  page).  That  it  is  not  a  printer's  error,  is  shown  by  the 
fact,  if  we  turn  the  leaf  over,  the  correct  number,  36,  follows  the 
false  21,  as  follows : 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE, 

New  Atlantis  Magnalia  Naturae 


183 


next  to  36 
and  other 
side  of 
21 


The  reader  will  at  once  be  struck  with  the  coincidence  that  35 
and  36  (the  correct  numbers  of  the  loose  leaf),  represent  the  num- 
bers of  the  plays  in  the  1623  folio  catalogue,  (35),  and  the  entire 
36,  counting  Troilus  and  Cressida,  omitted  mysteriously  from  the 
catalogue.  No  reflective  reader  can  imagine  an  entire  play  was 
uncatalogued  and  unpaged  without  a  purpose  ?  Moreover,  the 
reader  will,  I  am  sure,  at  once  be  struck  with  the  astonishing  dis- 
covery, that  if  we  add  the  correct  paging  to  the  false  paging  (taking 
its  place),  we  get  56,  which  is  the  number  of  the  Minor  Arcana 
(Lesser  Secrets)  of  the  Tarot : 

35+21  =56. 

Moreover,  56  is  the  page  of  1st  K.  H.  IV.,  where  we  find  twenty- 
one  entries  of  Francis  Bacon^s  christian  name. 


CHAPTER  XL 

"Measube  for  Measure." 

"That  at  the  first,  the  soul  of  man  was  not  produced  by  Heaven  or  Earth,  but 
was  breathed  immediately  from  God.  So  that  the  ways  and  proceeaings  of  God 
with  Spirits  are  not  included  in  Nature.  Tliat  is,  in  the  laws  of  Heaven  and  Earth  ; 
but  are  reserved  to  the  law  of  his  Secret  Will  ;  wherein  God  worketh  still,  and  resteth 
not  from  the  work  of  redemption.''''    {Bacon's  Confession  of  Faith,  p.  97.) 

Very  few  people  are  aware  of  the  depths  of  the  art  known  as 
Shakespeare's.  Fewer  still  are  aware  of  the  parallels  borrowed 
from  scriptural  parable  and  applied  to  the  plays,  even  to  the  mi- 
nutest particulars.  The  story  of  Shylock  is  that  of  the  Unmerciful 
Servant,  and  in  the  three  caskets  we  have  scriptural  allusion  to  the 
parable  of  the  pearl  of  great  price.  The  opening  of  the  silver  casket 
is  found  thus  described  : 

The  fire  seven  times  tried  this, 
Seven  times  tried  that  judgment  is 
That  did  never  choose  amiss,     (Act  ii.) 

Compare — "  The  words  of  the  Lord  are  pure  words :  As  silver 
tried  in  a  furnace  of  earth  purified  seven  times. '^  (Psalm  xii.,  6.) 

The  entire  play  of  Measure  for  Measure  is  a  parable  of  the  fall 
OF  MAN,  and  of  the  ATONEMENT,  Man  being  personified  in  the  char- 
acter of  Angela,  as  the  fallen  angel  generically  applied.  The  Duke 
in  this  play  is  a  representative  portrait  of  Providence,  allied  to  the 
parable  of  the  talents. 

That  the  poet's  intention  was  to  shadow  forth  in  the  Duke, 
Divine  Providence,  invisible,  but  from  whose  all- seeing  eye  nothing 
can  be  hid,  is  plain  from  these  words : 

Angela,    Oh,  my  dread  Lord, 
I  should  be  guiltier  than  my  guiltiness. 
To  think  I  can  be  undi  seer  noble, 
When  I  perceive  Your  Grace,  like  Power  Divine, 
Hath  look'd  upon  my  passes.     (Act  v.) 

Lord  Bacon  opens  the  fifth  book  of  the  Be  Augmentis  with  the 
words : 

"  The  knowledge  respecting  the  understanding  of  Man  (excellent 
King),  and  that  other  respecting  his  Will,  are,  as  it  were.  Twins  by 
birth.    For  the  Purity  of  Illumination,  and  the  Liberty  of  Will 

184 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  185 

began  together,  fell  together.  Nor  is  there  in  these  in  the  Uni- 
versal Nature  of  things  so  intimate  a  sympathy,  as  that  of  Truth 
and  Goodness.  The  more  shame  for  Learned  men,  if  they  be  for 
Knowledge  like  Winged  Angels;  for  base  desires  they  be  like 
serpents,  which  crawl  in  the  dust,  carrying  indeed  about  them 
minds  like  a  mirror  or  glass,  but  menstruous  and  distained." 
(p.  217,  Book  V.  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640.) 

Compare  this  in  Hamlet : 

Hamlet.  What  a  piece  of  work  is  a  man  !  How  noble  in  reason! 
how  infinite  in  faculty!  In  form  and  moving,  how  express  and 
admirable !  In  Action  how  like  an  Angel !  In  apprehension  how 
like  a  God!    (Act  ii.  sc.  2.) 

The  author  often  seems  to  have  the  Garden  after  the  Fall, 
before  his  mind. 

Fie  on't !  Oh,  fie,  fie,  'tis  an  unweeded  garden 
That  grows  to  seed.     Things  rank  and  gross  in  nature 
Possess  it  merely."     (Act  i.  sc.  2.) 
The  poet  author  gives  us  a  direct  key  to  his  intention : 
Oh,  what  may  man  within  him  hide, 
Though  Angel  on  the  outward  side? 
The  authors  of  the  Perfect  Way  write  of  the  parable  of  the  fall : 
"  For  a  parable  it  is  and  not  a  history,  as  ordinarily  understood, 
but  having  a  hidden,  that  is,  a  mystic  meaning;  a  parable,  more- 
over, which,  while  founded  upon  a  particular  fact,  is  true  for  all 
time,  in  that  it  is  perpetually  being  enacted.    Being  thus,  the  par- 
able of  the  fall  constitutes  an  eternal  Verity. "  (p.  175,  third  edi- 
tion.) 

This  is  exactly  how  the  Kosicrucians  considered  this  problem. 
The  fall  of  man  is  allied  and  embodied  with  the  parable  of  the  tal- 
ents, with  which  Measure  for  Measure  opens.  The  sin  Angelo  is  set 
up,  (in  the  Duke's  absence),  to  put  down  and  weed  out,  is  just  the  sin 
he  falls  under,  and  constitutes  the  key  center  of  the  action  of  the 
play.  It  is  evident  the  poet- author  considered  this  sin,  not  only  the 
occasion  of  the  fall  (as  also  stated  by  the  Rosicrucian,  Robert  Fludd), 
but  like  Goethe  constituted  it  the  master  temptation  and  chief 
source  of  evil. 

That  the  Duke  has  instructed  Angelo  to  weed  the  particular  vice, 
with  which  the  motive  of  the  play  is  pregnant,  is  apparent  in  these 
lines : 

Twice  treble  shame  on  Angelo 
To  weed  my  vice,  and  let  his  grow. 
In  the  biblical  story,  this  particular  sin  brought  death  into  the 
world.    So  in  the  play  we  at  once  find  the  parallel  of  Claudio  under 
sentence  of  death  for  the  same  vice. 


186  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

Blood,  thou  art  blood, 
Let's  write  good  angel  on  the  devil's  horn ; 
^Tis  not  the  deviVs  crest.    (Act  ii.  sc.  3.) 

Here  we  have  a  hint  as  to  what  the  poet  considered  the  devil's 
crest, —  viz.,  the  sin  Angelo  tempts  Isabella  to  commit  with  him,  and 
which  Faust  also  falls  under  in  apostasy  to  the  talents  he  renounces. 

That  strange  writer,  Alphonse  Louis  Constant,  better  known  by 
his  nom  deplume  Eliphas  Levi,  writes : 

"  The  Sphinx  has  not  only  a  man's  head,  but  also  the  breasts  of 
a  woman — canst  thou  resist  feminine  attractions  ?  No ;  is  it  not  so  ? 
And  here  thou  dost  laugh  in  replying,  parading  thy  moral  weakness 
for  the  glorification  of  the  vital  and  physical  power  within  thee. 
Be  it  so,  however !  I  allow  this  homage  to  be  paid  to  the  Ass  of 
Sterne  or  Apuleius;  that  the  ass  has  its  merits  I  dispute  in  no  way; 
it  was  sacred  to  Priapus,  as  the  goat  was  to  the  god  of  Mendes. 
But  leave  it  for  what  it  is,  and  decide  if  it  shall  be  thy  master,  or 
if  thou  wilt  be  master  of  it.  He  alone  can  truly  possess  the  pleas- 
ure of  love  who  has  conquered  the  love  of  pleasure.  To  be  able  to 
make  u.«e  of  anything  and  to  abstain  from  doing  so,  is  to  be  twice 
able.  By  thy  passions  the  woman  enchains  thee;  he  master  of  thy 
passions,  and  thou  wilt  enchain  her.''^  (InitiatoryExercises  and  Prep- 
arations, p.  23,  Mysteries  of  Magic.    Waite.) 

Give  me  that  man 
That  is  not  passion's  slave,  and  I  will  wear  him 
In  my  heart's  core ;  ay,  in  my  heart  of  hearts, 
As  I  do  thee.     {Hamlet,  act  iii.  sc.  2.) 

And  in  the  poems : 

cxxix. 

The  expense  of  spirit  in  a  waste  of  shame 

Is  lust  in  action ;  and  till  action,  lust 

Is  perjured,  murderous,  bloody,  full  of  blame, 

Savage,  extreme,  rude,  cruel,  not  to  trust, 

Enjoy'd  no  sooner  but  despised  straight, 

Past  reason  hunted,  and  no  sooner  had 

Past  reason  hated,  as  a  swallow'd  bait 

On  purpose  laid  to  make  the  taker  mad ; 

Mad  in  pursuit  and  in  possession  so ; 

Had,  having,  and  in  quest  to  have,  extreme ; 

A  bliss  in  proof,  and  proved,  a  very  woe  ; 

Before,  a  joy  proposed;  behind,  a  dream. 

All  this  the  world  well  knows ;  yet  none  knows  well 

To  shun  the  heaven  that  leads  men  to  this  hell. 

This  I  consider  to  be  the  key  note  of  the  entire  play,  and  of  the 
poet's  conception  of  evil  as  lust.    In  that  purely  Kosicrucian  legend 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  187 

of  Doctor  Fanstus,  may  be  perceived  exactly  the  same  lessou  incul- 
cated. The  temptation  of  Marguerite,  presented  by  Mephistopheles 
to  Faust,  is  the  arch  temptation  of  the  flesh,  for  which  Faust  for- 
sakes all  his  higher  seeking  after  knowledge,  to  find  a  fool's  paradise 
with  hell  behind  and  after  it.  Faust  sells  his  immortality  for  brief 
pleasure.  It  is  an  epitome  of  the  temptation  and  fall, —  the  conflict 
of  the  two  souls  in  man,  one  of  which  draws  him  down  to  earth,  and 
the  other  lifts  him  up  to  heaven,  which  idea  Goethe  has  fully 
seized. 

The  authors  of  Tlie  Perfect  Way  write  : 

*'The  doctrine  of  the  soul  is  embodied  in  the  parable  of  the 
Talents.  Into  the  soul  of  the  individual  is  breathed  the  Spirit  of 
God,  divine,  pure,  and  without  blemish.  It  is  God.  And  the  indi- 
vidual has  in  his  earth  life  to  nourish  that  spirit  and  feed  it  as  a 
flame  with  oil.  When  we  put  oil  into  a  lamp,  the  essence  passes 
into  and  becomes  flame.  80  is  with  the  soul  of  him  who  nourishes 
the  spirit.  It  grows  gradually  pure  and  becomes  spirit.  By  this 
spirit  the  body  is  enhghtened  as  a  lamp  by  the  flame  within  it. 
Now,  the  flame  is  not  ihe  oil,  for  the  oil  may  be  there  without  the 
light ;  yet  tbe  flame  cannot  be  there  without  the  oil.  The  body 
then,  is  the  lamp  case,  into  which  the  oil  is  poured,  and  this,  the 
oil,  is  the  soul,  a  tine  and  combustible  fluid;  and  the  flame  is  the 
Divine  Spirit,  which  is  not  born  of  the  oil,  but  is  communicated  by 
God  from  within.  We  may  quench  this  spirit  utterly,  and  thence- 
forward we  shall  have  no  immortality;  but  when  the  lamp  case 
breaks  the  oil  will  be  spilt  on  the  earth,  and  a  few  fumes  will  for  a 
time  arise  from  it,  and  then  it  will  expend  itself,  leaving  at  last  no 
trace.  Thus,  as  the  parable  of  the  Talents,  where  God  has  given 
five  talents,  man  pays  back  ten;  or  he  pays  back  nothing  and  per- 
ishes."   (p.  52,  Perfect  Way,  1887.) 

This  parable  finds  its  perfect  reflection  at  the  commencement  of 
Measure  for  Measure,  in  the  Duke's  speech  to  Angelo : 

Duke.    Thyself  and  thy  belongings 
Are  not  thine  own  so  proper  as  to  waste 
Thyself  upon  thy  virtues,  they  on  thee. 
Heaven  doth  with  us  as  we  with  torches  do, 
Not  light  them  for  themselves ;  for  if  our  virtues 
Did  not  go  forth  of  us,  'twere  all  alike 
As  if  we  had  them  not.     Spirits  are  not  finely  touched 
But  to  fine  issues,  nor  Nature  never  lends 
The  smallest  scruple  of  her  excellence 
But,  like  a  thrifty  goddess,  she  determines 
Herself  the  glory  of  a  creditor, 
Both  thanks  and  use.     (Act  i.  sc.  1.) 

This  is  the  parable  of  the  talents,  which  can  only  be  obeyed  by 


188  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUHE. 

purity, — that  is  obedience  to  the  first  intention  that  man  should 
live  upright.  In  obedience  to  this  injunction  man  is  an  angel,  and 
bears  upon  himself  the  impress  or  signet  of  his  Creator  as  such : 

Ang.  Now,  good  my  Lord, 

Let  there  be  some  more  test  made  of  my  metal, 
Before  so  noble  and  so  great  a  figure 
Be  stamp'd  upon  it.     (Act  i.  sc.  1.) 

Here  is  the  figure  of  speech,  so  to  speak,  saying  as  much, —  that 
the  talents  rightly  used,  constitute  the  Divine  coinage,  undebased, 
and  that  Angelo,  as  a  representative  of  Providence,  is  worthy  to  bear 
its  figure.  Now,  mark,  Angelo  falls  to  the  very  vice  he  is  set  up  to 
put  down.  The  entire  play  is  full  of  pregnant  hints  for  my  theory, 
Mistress  Overdone  and  Pompey  furnishing  keys  for  the  repulsive  side 
of  the  vice  which  constitutes  as  it  were  the  darkest  depths  of  the 
abyss  into  which  man  can  fall  by  one  particular  sin. 

The  authors  of  TJie  Perfect  Way  identify  *'  the  serpent  with  the 
will  of  the  body."  Again,  *' It  is  thus  no  specific  act,  but  the 
general  tendency  towards  matter  and  sense,  that  constitutes  the 
fall.''  (p.  166.)  ''Into  this  sin  of  idolatry  the  human  heart 
declines,  by  listening  to  the  monitions  and  beguilements  of  the 
lower  will  of  the  sensual  nature."  {Ih.) 

"  Whatever  is  given  to  the  body  is  taken  from  the  spirit. "  (p.  224. ) 

The  authors  of  The  Perfect  Way,  describe  the  spiritual  part  of 
man  as  "  The  leaven  taken  by  the  woman  —  the  divine  Sophia  or 
Wisdom, —  and  hidden  in  three  measures  of  meal,  namely,  the  soul, 
the  perisoul  and  the  body,  until  the  whole  is  leavened;  until,  that 
is,  the  whole  man  is  so  permeated  and  lightened  by  it,  that  he  is 
finally  transmuted  into  spirit  and  becomes  'one  with  God.'*  "  (p.  5.) 

Is  it  not  possible  the  title,  Measure  for  Measure,  has  some  con- 
nection with  this  parable?  Man  fell  by  woman,  man  is  restored  by 
the  Divine  Woman, —  the  soul.  So  it  is  with  Angelo;  he  falls  by 
that  which,  through  the  aid  of  invisible  Providence,  is  to  be  the 
unknown  means  of  his  salvation  —  the  substitution  of  Mariana  for 
Isabella,  by  the  Divine  Power. 

"  To  the  masculine  function  is  accorded  precedence  in  point  of 
time ;  to  the  feminine  in  point  of  dignity.  And  it  is  thus  that  the 
manifestation  of  the  Divine  will  and  power  in  creation  is  followed  by 
the  manifestation  of  the  Divine  Love  and  Wisdom  in  Redemption, 
and  that  the  agent  of  this  last  is  always  the  woman.  She  it  is  who, 
by  her  intuition  of  God,  bruises  the  head  of  the  serpent  of  matter, 
and  her  sons  they  are  who  get  the  victory  over  him."  {Perfect 
Way,  61.) 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE.  189 

"  Maria,  the  sea,  is  the  water  mystically  appointed  for  the  wash- 
ing away  of  sin."     (p.  30,  Clothed  in  the  Sun.    Anna  Kingsford.) 

It  may  he  noted  how  alike  the  name  Mariana  is  to  Maria.  It  is 
Mariana's  substitution  by  the  Duke  in  place  of  Isabella  that  saves 
Angelo  from  the  fall  he  intended,  the  sin  he  conceived.  Like  Eve, 
Maria,  and  the  sea,  are  mystical  synonyms  for  the  soul,  which  is 
called  ''  Bitterness  of  the  Deep.''  {Clothed  in  the  Sun,  p.  30.)  All 
this  is  closely  connected  with  the  flood,  and  creation.  One  of  the  days 
appointed  to  the  Eleusinian  mysteries  was  dedicated  to  a  visit  to  the 
sea,  as  allotted  to  purification. 

It  is  bighly  probable  Angelo's  reconciliation  to  his  wife,  Mariana, 
is  a  symbolical  hint  for  the  Atonement.  The  authors  of  the  Perfect 
Way  write : 

"  The  uniting  of  the  human  will  with  the  Divine  Will,  or,  as  it  is 
sometimes  called,  the  Reconciliation,  which  is  but  another  word  for 
the  Atonement."     (p.  3.) 

I  am  convinced  the  author  intended  something  akin  to  this  in 
the  way  Angelo  is  reconciled  by  the  Divine  Will  of  the  invisible 
ubiquitous  Duke  to  his  wife  Mariana.  I  am  certain  Angelo  is  a 
generic  name  for  man  in  a  collective  sense. 

There  is  a  vast  moral  in  all  this  if  we  chose  to  see  it  rightly.  The 
author's  seeming  intention  is  to  show  how  universal,  how  powerful 
this  peculiar  vice  is,  and  how  all  ages,  all  times  smack  of  it. 
Authority  being  even  unable  to  act  from  falling  under  the  same 
indictment.  The  fact  that  one  so  high  in  position  as  Angelo,  set  up 
to  represent  what  seems  an  invisible,  ubiquitous  godhead  as  vice- 
regent,  should  fall  a  prey  to  the  offense  he  is  to  root  out,  shows  how 
wide,  how  radical  was  this  sin,  in  the  author's  mind, —  a  universal 
fall,— a  general  declension  from  the  Divine  injunction.  Man  is 
incapable  of  dealing  with  it,  because  no  one  can  show  the  example; 
that  is,  the  moral.  And  against  all  this  in  high  relief,  like  some 
alabaster  statue  of  purity,  set  against  a  dark  background,  stands 
that  perfect  picture  of  chastity  —  Isabella !  The  author's  intention 
here  can  hardly  be  mistaken.  He  sets  purity  or  chastity  at  a  higher 
figure  than  life  or  death, —  outweighing  even  a  brother's  execution. 

The  authors  of  The  Perfect  Way  write  : 

"  It  is  through  the  soul,  and  the  soul  only,  that  man  learns  the 
Divine  will,  and,  learning  it,  saves  himself.  And  the  clearness 
with  which  the  soul,  on  her  part,  discerns  and  transmits  that  will 
depends  upon  her  purity.  In  the  word  purity  lies  the  essence  of  all 
religion.     It  is  the  burden  of  the  whole  Bible,  and  of  all  Bibles. 


190  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUHE. 

Always  is  purity  insisted  on  as  the  means  to  salvation ;  always 
impurity  as  the  cause  of  condemnation.  To  this  uniformity  of  doctrine 
the  parable  of  the  Fall  is  no  exception.  With  the  soul  pure  man 
dwells  in  Eden  and  'sees  God.'  With  the  soul  unpure,  he  is  driven 
forth  into  the  wilderness."     (p.  184.) 

Bacon  writes  in  his  Confession  of  Faith  : 

"  That  God  created  man  in  his  own  image,  in  a  reasonable  soul, 
in  innocency,  in  free-will,  and  in  sovereignty.  That  He  gave  him 
a  law  and  commandment,  which  was  in  his  power  to  keep,  but  he 
kept  it  not.  That  man  made  a  total  dejection  from  God,  presuming 
to  imagine  that  the  commandments  and  prohibitions  of  God  were 
not  the  rules  of  good  and  evil,  but  that  good  and  evil  had  their  own 
principles  and  beginnings. 

"  That  upon  the  fall  of  man,  death  and  vanity  entered  by  the 
justice  of  God,  and  the  image  of  God  in  man  was  defaced,  and 
heaven  and  earth,  which  were  made  for  man's  use,  were  subdued  to 
corruption  by  his  fall."     (p.  97,  part  1,  Besuscitatio,  1671.) 

In  the  virgin  chastity  of  Isabella  may  be  seen  the  hint,  that  it  is 
chastity  alone  which  can  bring  about  the  atonement  of  Angelo. 
In  the  action  concerning  the  Duke,  his  pretended  journey,  his  dis- 
guise as  a  friar,  and  his  ubiquitous,  though  invisible,  presence  over- 
ruling the  entire  plot  of  the  play,  we  may  easily  perceive  the 
parable  of  the  Steward,  who  made  a  journey  into  a  far  country, 
and  to  each  of  his  servants  gave  so  many  talents.  That  is,  it  is  the 
parable  of  Divine  Providence,  invisible  but  ubiquitous,  searching 
out  the  hearts  of  men,  and  overriding,  with  Divine  action,  indi- 
vidual good  and  evil.  The  Duke  is  a  type  of  God  as  spirit,  bring- 
ing about  the  atonement  and  restitution  of  fallen  man, — pictured 
In  the  character  of  Angelo, —  the  fallen  angel  man  ! 

Isabella  is,  I  am  convinced,  the  heavenly  yirgin  of  the 
Hermetic  philosophers;  that  is,  the  soul  and  intellect,  whom  we  find 
represented  in  Beatrice,  as  Dante's  guide.  Therefore,  in  seeking  to 
seduce  her,  Angelo  is  conspiring  against  himself,  that  is,  employ- 
ing his  will,  or  worse  self,  to  debase  and  defile  that  which  is  truly 
divine  in  him,  and  god-like.  In  like  manner,  the  student  may 
observe,  it  is  through  Isabella  the  reconciliation  or  at-one-ment 
(atonement)  between  Angelo  and  Mariana  is  effected.  That  is  to 
say,  it  is  through  the  virtues  of  Isabella  and  all  she  symbolizes,  that 
fallen  man  can,  like  Angelo,  be  restored  once  more  to  divine  grace 
and  pardon.  With  regard  to  my  theory  of  the  occasion  of  the  fall, 
the  reader  may  be  referred  to  Saint  Augustine,  where  he  will  find 
the  same  idea  inculcated  in  The  City  of  God.    Sir  Thomas  Brown, 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE.  191 

the  author  of  the  Beligio  Medici,  hints  at  the  same  doctrine,  and  all 
the  Cabalists  are  as  one  upon  this  point.  Kobert  Fludd,  the  great 
English  Rosicrucian,  "  detects  the  origin  of  evil  in  the  union  of  the 
sexes;  the  sensual  organs  of  the  mother  of  mankind  were  first  opened 
by  the  fruit  which  blasted  the  future  human  race.  ( D'Israelis'  Ameni- 
ties of  Literature.^'    Fludd.) 

The  temptation  and  fall  is  a  parable,  applying  itself  to  every  indi- 
vidual life,  that  surrenders  nobler  gifts  and  future  ends  for  present 
passions  and  pleasures.  The  entire  parable  of  the  garden  is  an 
allegory  of  man  as  angel,  and  pure  spirit,  living  in  comparative 
purity  and  peace  with  nature,  and  from  this  paradise  he  drives  him- 
self out,  by  losing  control  over  his  body  and  passions.  In  Measure 
for  Measure  wc  find  exactly  the  same  enunciation  of  the  liberty  of 
the  will  as  lost  with  the  purity  of  illumination,  as  Bacon  enunciates. 
In  reply  to  Isabella's  entreaty  for  pardon  for  her  brother  Claudio's 
life,  we  find  Angelo  exclaiming : 

Angelo.    I  will  not  do't. 

Isab.    But  can  you  if  you  would  ? 

Angelo.    Look,  zvhat  I  will  not,  that  I  cannot  do. 

(Act.  ii.  sc.  2.) 

Saint  Augustine  writes:  *'  The  will,  therefore,  is  then  truly  free, 
when  it  is  not  the  slave  of  vices  and  sins.  Such  was  it  given  us  by 
God ;  and  this  being  lost  by  its  own  fault,  can  only  be  restored  by 
Him,  who  was  able  at  first  to  give  it. "  (Book,  xiv.  TJw  City  of 
God.) 


CHAPTER  XII. 
•  The  Rosiceucians. 

I  lift  mine  eyes,  and  all  the  windows  blaze 

With  forms  of  saints  and  holy  men  who  died ; 
Hero  martyred  and  hereafter  glorified ; 

And  the  Great  Kose  upon  its  leaves  displays 
Christ's  triumph,  and  the  angelic  roundelays, 

With  splendor  upon  splendor  multiplied ; 
And  Beatrice  again  at  Dante's  side 

No  more  rebukes,  but  smiles  her  words  of  praise. 

{Longfellmo.) 

THE  ROSE. 

"  There  can  be  little  doubt  that  the  Rose  came  from  Damascus, 
probably  introduced  into  Europe  by  the  Crusaders  or  some  of  the 
early  travelers  in  the  East,  who  speak  in  glowing  terms  of  the  beau- 
ties of  the  gardens  of  Damascus.  The  author  oIl  Eothen,  describing 
the  gardens  of  Damascus,  writes :  *  High,  high,  above  your  head, 
and  on  every  side  all  down  to  the  ground,  the  thicket  is  hemmed  in 
and  choked  up  by  the  interlacing  boughs  that  droop  with  the 
weight  of  Roses,  and  load  the  slow  air  with  their  damask  breath. 
There  are  no  other  flowers.  The  Rose  trees  which  I  saw  were  all  of 
the  kind  we  call  "  Damask;  ''they  grow  to  an  immense  height  and 
size"  {Eothen,  ch.  xxvii.).  It  was  not  tilllong  after  the  Crusades  that 
the  Damask  Rose  was  introduced  into  England,  for  Hakluy  t  in  1582, 
says:  'In  time  of  memory  many  things  have  been  brought  in 
that  were  not  here  before,  as  the  Damask  Rose  by  Doctor  Linaker, 
King  Henry  the  Seventh's,  and  King  Henry  the  Eighth's  physi- 
cian' {Voyages,  vol.  ii.)"  (p.  252.  Plant  Lore  of  Shakespeare. 
Ellacombe.) 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  Rosicrucians,  whose  emblem  was 
the  Crucified  Rose,  evidently  trace  back  their  origins,  or  at  least 
connect  their  secret  lore  with  Damascus.  In  the  Fama  Frater- 
nitatis  we  read  of  the  founder  of  the  society,  Christian  Rosy  Cross: 

"  Hereby  was  that  high  and  noble  spirit  of  brother  C.  R.  C.  so 
stirred  up,  that  Jerusalem  was  not  so  much  now  in  his  mind  as 
Damasco.  There  the  wise  men  received  him  not  as  a  stranger  (as 
he  himself  witnesseth),  but  as  one  whom  they  had  long  expected; 
they  called  him  by  his  name,  and  showed  him  other  secrets  out  of 
his  cloyster,  whereat  he  could  not  but  mightily  wonder." 

(pp.  66,  67;  History  of  the  Bosicrudans.    Waite.) 
192 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUHE.  193 

The  Damask  Eose  figures  as  a  drug  in,  ''  a  bill  of  medicynes  fur- 
nished for  the  use  of  Edward  I.,  1306-7:" — "  Item  pro  aqua  rosata 
de  Bamaso  lb.  xl,  iiiilf  {Archceological  Journal,  vol.  xiv.  271.) 

Lord  Bacon  introduces  roses  into  his  receipt  for  the  gout,  and  in 
the  description  of  the  chemist's  shop,  in  Borneo  and  Juliet,  we  read : 

Eemnants  of  pack-thread  and  old  cakes  of  Roses 
Were  thinly  scattered  to  make  up  a  show. 

(Act  V.  sc.  1,  p.  47.) 

The  Rev.  Henry  Ellacombe,  in  his  Plant  Lore  and  Garden  Craft 
of  Shakespeare,  remarks : 

"  There  is  no  flower  so  often  mentioned  by  Shakespeare  as  the 
Hose,  and  he  would  probably  consider  it  the  queen  of  flowers,  for 
it  was  so  deemed  in  his  time."     (p.  248.) 

There  are  over  seventy  introductions  of  the  Rose  in  the  plays. 
And  there  can  be  no  doubt  the  Rose  is  introduced  by  the  author 
often  with  an  esoteric  or  masonic  signification.  There  has  been  a 
dispute  as  to  the  origin  of  the  word  ^  Rosicrucian,'  some  deriving  it 
from  a  rose  and  cross,  and  others,  like  Mosheim,  from  ros  dew  and 
light  or  lux.  But  both  these  explanations  are  perfectly  reconcile- 
able  with  each  other.  It  is  common  to  find  dew  associated  with 
roses  in  a  profoundly  mystic  sense. 

"  The  water  that  did  spring  from  ground 
She  would  not  touch  at  all, 
But  washed  her  hands  with  dew  of  Heaven 
That  on  sweet  Roses  fall. " 
{The  Lamentable  Fall  of  Queen  Ellinor.    Moxburghe  Ballads.) 

It  is  evident  the  author  of  the  plays  alludes  to  the  same  con- 
nection of  Dew  and  Boses. 

So  sweet  a  kiss  the  golden  sun  gives  not 
To  those  fresh  morning  drops  upon  the  Bose. 

{Love's  Labor'' s  Lost,  act  iv.  sc.  3.) 

Many  dictionaries  write  under  the  word  ^Bosicrucians,^ "  not  rosa 
crux,  rose  cross,  but  ros  crux,  dew  cross. "  This  is  all  very  fine,  but 
the  emblem  of  the  Rosicrucians,  a  Crucified  Rose,  mounted  on  a 
Calvary,  with  rays  issuing  from  it,  proves  the  Rose  and  Cross  did 
play  a  first  part  in  the  imagery  The  truth  is  the  Rose  is  one  of  the 
most  ancient  and  most  profound  symbols  in  existence,  and  is  con- 
nected by  Dante  with  the  ineffable  Light  of  the  Shekinah.  We  have 
only  to  recall  how  Apuleius  regained  his  original  shape,  from  that 
of  an  ass,  by  eating  roses,  to  feel  assured  that  in  classical  times  the 
Rose  had  a  recondite  meaning,  as  we  may  indeed  know  by  the  fact 

13 


194  THE  COLUMUBS  OF  LITEBATUEE. 

that  the  statue  of  Diana  of  Ephesus  was  covered  with  roses  and  bees. 
The  EosC;  in  Christian  art,  is  associated  with  Saintship,  and  Saint 
Dorothea  is  depicted  carrying  roses  in  a  basket;  Saint  Elizabeth  of 
Portugal,  Saint  Rose  of  Viterbo,  Saint  Rosalia,  Saint  Angelus,  Saint 
Victoria,  Saint  Rose  of  Lima,  wear  crowns  of  roses.  "  The  Red 
Rose,"  says  Sir  John  Mandeville,  "sprang  from  the  extinguished 
brands  heaped  around  a  virgin  martyr  at  Bethlehem. "  Virginity, 
and  purity,  were  associated  with  the  Rose  by  the  author  of  the  plays: 

Olivia.    Caesario,  by  the  Boses  of  the  spring, 
By  maidliood,  honor,  truth  and  everthing, 
I  love  thee  so.     {Twelfth  Night,  act  iii.  sc.  1  ) 

Sir  John  Mandeville  writes: 

''  A  Jewish  maiden  of  Bethlehem  (whom  Southey  named  Zillah) 
was  beloved  by  one  Hamuel,  a  brutish  sot.  Zillah  nijected  his  suit 
and  Hamuel,  in  revenge,  gave  out  that  Zillah  was  a  demoniac,  and 
she  was  condemned  to  be  burnt;  but  God  averted  the  flames,  the 
stake  budded,  and  the  maid  stood  unharmed  under  a  rose  tree  full  of 
white  and  red  roses,  then  first  seen  on  earth  since  Paradise  ivas  lost.''^ 

The  ''  Mystical  Rose,"  was  one  of  the  titles  of  the  Virgin,  and 
the  head  roll  or  Rose  Article,  known  by  the  name  Rosaet,  and  con- 
nected with  the  repetition  of  prayers,  was  said  to  be  given  by  the 
Virgin  to  Saint  Dominic.  The  Rosary  consists  of  three  parts,  each 
of  which  contains  five  mysteries  connected  with  Christ  or  his  Virgin 
Mother.     Dante  hints  at  the  same  thing.    Beatrice  asks  Dante : 

"  Why  doth  my  face  so  much  enamor  thee, 
That  to  the  garden  fair  thou  turn'st  not, 
Which  under  the  rays  of  Christ  is  blooming? 
There  is  the  Rose  in  ivhich  the  Word  Divine 
•    Became  incarnate  ;  there  the  lilies  are 

By  whose  perfume  the  good  way  was  discovered." 

(Canto  xxii.  Paradiso.    Longfellow,  567.) 

This  is  the  Virgin  Mary,  Rosa  Mundi,  Rosa  Mystica.  This  evi- 
dently is  also  connected  with  the  story  of  Fair  Rosamond,  and  refers  to 
the  Logos  doctrine,  or  Divine  Wisdom,  which,  indeed,  is  the  Heavenly 
Virgin,  who  is  instructing  and  guiding  Dante.  Fair  Rosamond  was 
buried  at  Godstow,  in  a  house  of  nuns,  with  these  lines  on  her  tomb : 
"  Hie  jacet  in  Tumba  Rosamundi,  non  Rosa  munda  ; 
Non  redolet,  sed  olet,  quae  redolere  solet." 

The  maze  or  labyrinth  which  Henry  the  Second  made  for  Rosa- 
mond, is  evidently  a  myth  alluding  to  the  world,  and  to  the  mys- 
teries, which  guard  under  the  Rose,  the  path  to  its  wisdom  incarnate 
in  it.    The  reader  will  perceive  at  once  how  the  Rose  crucified  of 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  195 

the  Rosicrucians  hints  at  the  entire  Christian  Logos  legend  in  a 
mystical  sense.  That  is,  the  wisdom  of  the  world  hidden  in  its  foun- 
dation of  sacrifice.  The  entire  problem  of  Bacon's  sacrifice  and 
renunciation  of  the  authorship  of  the  plays,  is  a  repetition  of  this 
doctrine,  I  believe.  And  when  we  find  such  entries  in  his  diaries  as 
"  Secrets  de  Bieu  "  (vide  Mrs.  Pott's  learned  and  interesting  work, 
Francis  Bacon  and  His  Secret  Society):  "  The  glory  of  God  is  to  con- 
ceal a  thing,  but  it  is  the  glory  of  a  King  to  find  it  out;  "  we  not  only 
find  hints  for  the  Solomon  of  the  Rosicrucians,  but  proof  Bacon's 
mind  was  concentric  with  Creation,  and  that  he  has  {in  an  humble 
ivay),  endeavored  to  imitate  God  in  the  silence  and  reserve  of  his 
wisdom  sacrificed  by  himself  {as  spirit)  in  his  works.  My  own  hum- 
ble opinion  is,  Christ  was  an  expounder  of  the  Logos  Doctrine,  the 
wisdom  being  always  typified  as  the  Son  of  God,  and  this  idea  is 
repeated  in  the  Sonnets  of  Shakespeare. 

Sir  Thomas  Brown  writes: 

The  Rose  of  Jericho  that  flourishes  every  year  just  about  Christ- 
mas Eve  is  famous  in  Christian  reports.  Though  it  be  dry,  yet  will 
it,  upon  imbibition  of  moisture,  dilate  its  leaves  and  explicate  its 
tiowers  contracted  and  seemingly  dried  up.  Which  quality  being 
observed  the  subtility  of  contrivers  did  commonly  play  this  shew 
upon  the  Eve  of  Our  Saviour's  Nativity,  when,  by  drying  the  plant 
again ,  it  closed  the  next  day,  and  so  pretended  a  double  mystery, 
referring  unto  the  opening  and  closing  of  the  womb  of  Mary.  '^ 
(Book  II.  p.  76,  Enquiries  into  Vulgar  and  Common  Errors.) 

It  is  in  Ecclesiasticus  we  read :  ''  I  was  exalted  like  a  palm 
tree  in  Engaddi,  and  as  a  Rose  in  Jericho'^  (cap.  24,  14).  The 
Rose  of  Jericho  is  sometimes  called  the  Rose  of  Saint  Mary. 
It  is  in  connection  with  Solomon  we  find  the  Rose  and  the 
Lily.  In  Canticles,  2 :  "  I  am  the  Rose  of  Sharon  and  the  Lily 
of  the  Valleys.''^  This  Lily  is  known  as  Lilium  Convallium,  or 
the  May  Lily.  It  is  with  these  words  Bacon  addresses  King  James  I. 
in  a  letter.  (The  name  of  Solomon's  wife  was  JSosa.  Purchase  his 
Pilgrimage,  p.  271,  eleventh  edition.)  "  It  is  observed  upon  a  place  in 
the  Canticles  by  some  :  Ego  sum  fios  campi  et  Lilium  Convallium; 
that,  a  dispari,  it  is  not  said  Ego  sum,  fios  Horti  et  IJlium  Montium, 
because  the  Majesty  of  that  Person  is  not  enclosed  for  a  few,  nor 
approximate  to  the  great. "  {A  Letter  of  offer  of  his  Service  to  King 
James  I.  upon  his  first  coming  in.    Part  I.  p.  20,  Resuscitatio,  1671.) 

This  is  proof  King  James  I.  was  at  the  head  of  the  Masons, — 
Bacon  probably  a  representative  Solomon. 


196  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE. 

In  a  valuable  and  rare  little  liosicrucian  pamphlet  published  in 
1614,  in  my  possession,  I  find  the  following  passage,  which  is  reflected 
again  in  Bacon's  Sylva  Sylvarum : 

Livor  iners  stimulos  generosis  mentibus  addit : 
Sic  per  foeda  Rosis  alha  crescit  odor. 

(p.  29   Conspicilium  Notitice  Inserviens  Oculis  ^gris,  Euchario 

Cygnceo,  1614.) 

This  signifies  that "  Envy  acts  as  a  stimulant  upon  generous  minds, 
just  as  the  rose  gains  in  sweetness  by  the  neighborhood  of  Garlic, " 

Bacon  writes : 

''  Rue  doth  prosper  much  and  becometh  stronger  if  it  be  set  by  a 
fig  tree.  Which  (we  conceive)  is  caused,  not  by  reason  of  friend- 
ship, but  by  extraction  of  contrary  juices.  The  one  drawing  juice 
fit  to  result  sweet,  the  other  bitter.  So  they  have  set  down  hke- 
wise,  that  a  rose  set  by  garlic  is  sweeter.''  (Exp.  481,  Century  V., 
Bacon's  Sylva  Sylvarum.) 

The  Rose  was  also  associated  with  Bacchus,  for  we  read  of 
chaplets  of  roses  crowming  the  heads  of  those  who  indulged  in 
Bacchanalian  orgies.    It  was  a  symbol  of  silence,  or  of  secrecy : 

Utque  latet  Rosa  Verna  suo  putamine  clausa 
Sic  OS  vincla  ferat,  validisque  arctetur  habenis, 
Indicatque  suis  prolixa  silentia  labris. 

Adonis  was  slain  by  a  boar.  Now,  it  is  very  interesting  and 
curious,  to  find  the  coat  of  arms  of  some  noble  German  families, 
combining  the  Boar  and  the  Rose.  I  allude  to  the  famous  family  of 
Eberstein,  who  lived  near  Baden,  and  who  were  Marquises  and 
Counts  of  Brandenburg.  Bacon  adopted  and  introduced,  during 
his  life  time,  the  emblem  of  a  Boar  into  his  coat  of  arms,  with 
what  object  it  is  impossible  to  say,  unless  as  a  device  associated 
with  the  name  of  Bacon.    In  Sonnet  liii.  we  read : 

Describe  Adonis,  and  the  counterfeit 
Is  poorly  imitated  after  you. 

And  in  the  next  the  rose  as  truth  is  described : 

0,  how  much  more  doth  beauty  beauteous  seem 

By  that  sw^eet  ornament  which  truth  doth  give  I 

The  rose  looks  fair,  but  fairer  we  it  deem 

For  that  sweet  odor  which  doth  in  it  live. 

The  canker-blooms  have  full  as  deep  a  dye 

As  the  perfumed  tincture  of  the  roses. 

Hang  on  such  thorns  and  play  as  wantonly 

When  summer's  breath  their  masked  buds  discloses : 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE,  197 

But,  for  their  virtue  only  is  their  show; 

They  Uve  unwoo'd  and  unrespected  fade^ 

Die  to  themselves,     i  Sweet  roses  do  not  so ; 

Of  their  sweet  deaths  are  sweetest  odors  made  : 
And  so  of  you,  beauteous  and  lovely  youth, 
When  that  shall  fade,  my  verse  distills  your  truth. 

(Sonnet  liv.) 

1  Sweet  roses  do  not  so ; 
Of  meir  sweet  deaths  are  sweetest  odors  made ; 
And  so  of  you,  beauteous  and  lovely  youth. 
When  that  shall  fade,  my  verso  distils  your  truth, 

(Sonnet  liv.) 
Thomas  Yaughan,  a  famous  Rosicrucian,  (known  by  the  name,  Eugenius  Phi- 
lalethes) ,  writes :  "In  regard  of  the  ashes  of  the  vegetables,  although  their  weaker, 
exterior  elements  expire  by  violence  of  the  fire,  yet  their  earth  cannot  be  destroyed, 
but  is  vitrilied.  The  fusion  and  transparency  of  this  substance  is  occasioned  by 
the  radical  moisture,  or  seminal  water  of  the  compound.  This  water  resists  the 
fury  of  the  fire  and  cannot  possibly  be  vanquished.  ^In  hac  Aqua  Bosa  latet  in 
hieme.''  These  two  principles  are  never  separated;  for  Nature  proceeds  not  so  far  in 
her  dissolutions.  When  death  hath  done  her  worst,  there  is  a  union  between  these 
two,  and  out  of  them  shall  God  raise  us  at  the  last  day."  The  Rose  is  here  repre- 
sented as  pent  up  in  a  crystal,  and  evidently  typifies  the  sleeping  powers  of  Nature 
during  Winter,  repeated  in  the  beautiful  story  of  Bkiae  Rose —  the  Sleeping  Beauty 
in  the  Wood.  Yaughan  is  enunciating  the  principle  of  immortality,  known  scien- 
tifically as  the  conservation  of  energy,  that  is,  that  the  spiritual  in  nature  is  in 
reality  her  economical  law  of  return  and  recuperation,  by  which  the  eternity  of  mat- 
ter is  established.  Now,  it  is  very  curious  to  find  this  idea  forming  the  ground 
idea  of  the  sonnets  ascribed  to  Shakespeare.  In  the  sonnets,  the  same  simile  of 
the  crystal  is  introduced  : 

Then,  were  not  Summer's  distillation  left, 
A  liquid  prisoner  pent  in  walls  of  glass. 

(Sonnet  v.) 
Sidney  introduces  exactly  the  same  image : 

"Have  you  ever  seen  a  pure  Rosewater  kept  in  a  crystal  glass ?  How  fine  it 
looks !  How  sweet  it  smells,  while  that  beautiful  glass  imprisons  it !  Break  the 
prison  and  let  the  water  take  his  own  course,  doth  it  not  embrace  dust  and  lose 
all  his  former  sweetness  and  fairness  ?  Truly  so  are  we,  if  we  have  not  the  stay, 
rather  than  the  restraint  of  crystaline  marriage." 

Compare  this  conservation  for  two  immortalities : 

Then  let  not  Winter's  ragged  hand  deface 
In  thee  thy  Summer,  ere  thou  be  distill'd ; 
Make  sweet  some  vial ;  treasure  thou  some  place 
With  beauty's  treasure,  ere  it  be  self  kill'd. 

(Sonnet  vi.) 
**  All  this  is  part  of  the  opening  argument  of  the  sonnets  —  the  preservation 
and  continuation  of  the  Rose ;  that  is,  of  Truth  in  heauty  dyed.''''     , 
From  fairest  creatures  we  desire  increase, 
That  thereby  beauty's  Base  might  never  die. 

(Sonnet  i.) 
Zoroaster  consecrated  wine,  a  rose,  a  cup  and  the  kernel  of  a  pomegranate. 
{Univ.  Hist.,  V.  400.)  The  Rose  was  sacred  to  Dionysus.  In  fact,  we  may  under- 
stand by  the  Rose,  the  spiritual  in  this  art,  so  to  say,  concealed  as  wisdom  (under 
the  Rose)  behind  art.  In  the  emblem  of  the  Rosicrucians,  a  Crucified  Rose,  may  be 
perceived  the  Logos  doctrine  at  work,  as  sacrifice,  secrecy  and  beauty,  in  connec- 
tion with  Plato's  philosophy.  I  may  be  here  allowed  to  remark,  I  have  been,  I 
believe,  charged  with  plagiarizing  the  Rosicrucian  theory  of  the  origin  of  the  plays, 
and  of  Bacon's  Atlantis  from  others  in  London.  I,  therefore,  here  cite  from  A 
New  Study  of  Shakespeare,  written  by  me  (published  in  1884,  by  Messrs. 
Trubner  &  Co.,  Paternoster  Row,  London,  E.  C):  "  It  is  more  likely,  however,  that 


198  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE, 

For  nothing  this  wide  universe  I  call, 
Save  thou,  my  rose;  in  it  thou  art  my  all. 

(Sonnet  cix.) 

It  was  also  sacred  to  Venus  and  to  Adonis,  and  I  think  the 
poem  of  Venus  and  Adonis  has  a  great  deal  in  it  pointing  to  the 
mystic  symbolism  of  the  Society  of  the  Rose  or  Rosicrucians : 

Est  Rosa  flos  Veneris,  cujus  quo  facta  laterent, 
Harpocrati  matris,  dona  dicavit  Amor ; 

Inde  Rosam  mensis  hospes  suspendit  Amicis, 
ConvivBB  ut  sub  ea  dicta  tacenda  sciant. 

The  sonnets  open  with  an  address  to  the  Rose  as  Truth'. 

From  fairest  creatures  we  desire  increase, 
That  thereby  beauty's  rose  might  never  die. 

(Sonnet  i.) 

Ah !  wherefore  with  infection  should  he  live, 
And  with  his  presence  grace  impiety, 
That  sin  by  him  advantage  should  achieve 
And  lace  itself  with  his  society  ? 
Why  should  false  painting  imitate  his  cheek 
And  steal  dead  seeing  of  his  living  hue? 
Why  should  poor  beauty  indirectly  seek 
Roses  of  shadow  since  his  rose  is  true  f 

(Sonnet  Ixvii.) 

It  is  the  marriage  of  Truth  and  Beauty,  pretigured  as  the  Rose, 
and  the  Secrets  under  art  (or  the  Rose),  which  open  the  theme  of 
these  sonnets. 

Saint  Augustine  writes  of  King  Solomon:— *' Solomon — had 
Peace  according  to  his  name,  for  Solomon  means  pacific.'^ 

\The  City  of  God,  Book  xvii.,  p.  190,  bods  vol.  ii.) 

Now  the  Rosicrucians  frequently  called  their  society,  The  Valley 
of  Peace,  which  is  perfectly  in  accordance  with  Solomon's  flower, 
The  Lily  of  the  Valley.  Lord  Bacon  in  his  Holy  War,  and  elsewhere, 
frequently  introduces  the  word  Peace,  as  ascribed  to  his  objects  and 
methods.    I  am  convinced  Bacon  was  the  representative  Solomon 

in  Love's  Martyr,  we  have  the  secret  society  hinted  at  in  the  New  Atlantis,  and 
that  the  author  of  the  plays  is  not '  that  affable  familiar  ghost,'  William  Shakespeare, 
whom  Greene  accused  of  'beautifying  himseif  in  others' feathers,' but  the  great 
mind  who  wrote :  '  Since  I  have  lost  much  time  with  this  age,  I  would  be  glad,  as 
God  shall  give  me  leave,  to  recover  it  with  posterity.'  Have  we  not  in  the  title 
(Love's  Martyr)  of  this  strange  work  a  hint  in  connection  with  the  love  philosphy 


of  Plato  and  the  Rosicrucians  at  the  same  time  ?"  (page  200.)  The  whole  of  this 
early  work  by  me  is  more  or  less  impregnated  by  the  theory  of  the  Rosicrucian 
character  of  the  plays.  I  went  so  far,  even,  as  to  furnish  a  photograph  of  Shake- 
speare's monument,  in  order  to  show  the  two  Cupids  placed  overhead — one  with  a 
torch,  the  other  with  a  spade — are  the  Rosicrucian  emblems  of  Love  and  Death. 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUHE.  199 

of  the  society  of  the  Rosie  Cross.  Like  Solomon,  he  wrote  a  natural 
history,  comprised  chiefly  of  the  history  of  plants  from  the  moss  on 
the  ground  to  the  cedar  of  Lebanon.  And  in  his  Two  Books 
Advancement  of  Learning j  1605,  he  inserts  twenty-five  of  the  prov- 
erbs of  Solomon,  with  lengthy  comments  upon  them.  Solomon  was 
a  type  of  Christ.  The  Temple  of  Solomon  (which  Archbishop  Tenison 
twice  applies  to  Bacon's  Instauration)  standing  for  the  "  House  of 
Wisdom,"  of  which  Christ  is  the  cornerstone. 

Bacon's  parables  of  Solomon  consist  of  thirty-four  proverbs 
inserted  in  his  De  Augmentis.  Curiously  his  New  Atlantis,  which  in 
scheme  and  ends  is  the  typical  New  Jerusalem,  also  consists  of 
thirty -four  pages,    (vii  Edition.) 

With  regard  to  Saint  Augustine  (St.  Austin),  who  was  the  great 
authority  of  the  Knights  Templar,  it  is  certainly  worthy  of  note  to 
find  Lord  Bacon  devoting  part  of  an  entire  book  of  his  Advancement 
of  Learning,  or  Be  Augmentis  Scientiarum,  to  that  Father.  The 
forty-ninth  deficient  of  a  new  world  of  sciences  being  entitled  "  Irenceus 
sive  de  gradibus  unitatis  in  civitate  Dei,  or  of  the  degrees  of  unity  in 
the  City  of  God. " 

This  is  another  hint  for  a  brotherhood  founded  upon  the  doc- 
trines of  Peace,  which,  indeed,  Bacon  dwells  much  upon  in  this  Defi- 
cient.   Bacon  commences  this  section  : 

''  It  imports  exceedingly  the  Peace  of  the  Church.  That  he  that 
makes  mention  of  Peace  shall  bear  away  that  answer,  Jehu  gave  to 
the  messengers,  "Is  it  Peace,  Jehu?  What  hast  thou  to  do  with 
Peace  f  Turn  and  follow  me. "  Peace  is  not  the  matter  that  many 
seek  after,  but  parties  and  sidings."     (p.  473  Advancement,  1640.) 

The  Rosicrucians  open  many  of  their  manifestoes  with  an  allusion 
to  Peace.  Thus  Eugenius  Philalethes,  ^^  To  the  most  illustrious  and 
truly  regenerated  brethren  R.  C,  to  the  peace-loving  apostles  of  the 
church,  in  this  contentious  age,  salutation /row  the  Centre  of  Peace.  ^^ 
{Anthroposophia  Theomagica  of  Thomas  Vaughan. ) 

Bacon  writes : 

"  I  like  better  that  entry  of  truth  which  cometh  peaceably 
with  chalk,  to  mark  up  those  minds  which  are  capable  to  lodge  and 
harbor  it."  {Bedargutio.) 

This  forms  the  thirty-fifth  aphorism  also  of  the  first  book  of  the 
Novum  Organum.  In  the  1614  Fama  Fraternitalis  we  read :  "  Truth 
\&  peaceable,  brief,  and  always  like  herself  in  all  things." 

Of  Free  Masonry  we  read :  "  During  the  reigns  of  Edward  V. 
and  Richard  III.  it  again  declined,  but  came  again  in  repute  on  the 


200  TEE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

accession  of  Henry  VII.,  in  1485.  It  was  then  patronized  by  the 
master  and  fellows  of  the  order  of  St.  John  of  Rhodes  {now  Malta), 
who,  at  a  Grand  Lodge  meeting  in  1500,  chose  Henry  for  their  pro- 
tector. On  the  24th  of  June,  1502,  a  lodge  of  masters  was  formed 
in  the  palace,  at  which  the  King  presided  as  G.  M.;  and  after 
appointing  his  wardens,  proceeded  in  great  state  to  Westminster 
Abbey,  where  the  foundation  stone  was  laid  of  that  excellent  piece 
of  Gothic  architecture,  called  Henry  the  VII.^s  Chapel.  The  cape 
stone  of  this  building  was  celebrated  in  1507.  The  following  noble 
structures  were  all  finished  in  this  reign  :  The  Palace  of  Richmond, 
the  College  of  Brazen-nose  in  Oxford,  as  also  Jesus  and  St.  John's 
College  in  Cambridge.'' 

Bacon,  in  his  History  of  King  Henry  the  Seventh,  introduces  the 
passage  I  have  italicized,  viz.,  that  Henry  VII.  was  chosen  by  the 
Knights  of  St.  John  of  Rhodes  for  their  protector.  I  need  hardly 
inform  the  reader,  the  Rosicrucians  traced  their  order  to  the  island 
of  Rhodes,  or  Boses,  which  latter  is  the  Greek  original  of  the  name. 
St.  John  was  their  patron  saint.    Bacon  writes : 

'^  With  this  answer  Jasper  Pons  returned,  nothing  at  all  dis- 
contented. And  yet  this  declaration  of  the  King  gave  him  that 
reputation  abroad,  as  he  was  not  long  after  elected  by  the  Knights 
OF  THE  Rhodes,  protector  of  their  order."  {History  King 
Henry  the  Seventh,  1622,  p.  202.) 

Notice,  Bacon  does  not  write  *'  Knights  of  Bhodes,^^  but  of  *'  the 
Bhodes, "  most  hkely  implying  "  Knights  of  the  Boses. ''  This  fact, 
I  imagine,  had  a  powerful  effect  upon  Bacon's  mind  in  making  him 
select  this  reign  for  a  history  which  should  contain  many  profound 
SECRETS  WRITTEN  AND  HIDDEN  UNDER  THE  RosE.  In  the  Collec- 
tion of  laudatory  poems  in  Latin,  prefixed  to  the  translation  of 
Bacon's  He  Augmentis,  (by  Gilbert  Wats,  1640),  entitled  Manes 
Verulamiani,  is  one  signed  by  Thomas  Randolph,  which  has 
these  lines : 

'^  Sed  quanta  effulgent  plus  quam  mortalis  ocelli 
Lumina,  dum  regni  mystica  sacra  canat? 
Dum  sic  naturae  leges,  arcanaque  Regum, 
Tanquam  a  secretis  esset  utrisque,  canat : 
Dum  canat  Henricum,  qui  Rex,  idemque  Sacerdos, 
Connubio  stabili  junxit  utramque  Rosam."  i 

1  There  is  another  Latin  poem  upon  Bucon^s  King  ffem-y  the  Semnth,  to  be  found 
in  the  Oj^era  Moralium  et  Civilium,  1638,  signed  T.  P. : 
De  Connubio  Rosarum. 
Septimus  Henri  cus  non  acre  et  mannore  vivit ; 
Yivit  at  in  chartis,  magno  Bacone,  tuis. 
Junge  duas,  Henrice,  rosas;  dat  mille  Baconas ; 
Quot  verba  in  libro,  tot  reor  esse  rosas. 
The  last  line  is  very  curious,  signifying  Bacon's  History  of  King  Henry  the 
Seventh  is  full  of  Secrets  or  Koses, —  for  the  Rose  means  a  secret — under  the  Rose  / 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF LJTEBATUBE.  201 

On  the  frontispiece  portrait  of  Bacon,  by  Marshall  {Advancement 
of  Learning,  1640),  Bacon  may  be  seen,  writing  upon  the  book  in 
front  of  him,  the  words : 

Connubio  jungam  stabili 

On  the  other  page  is  written  : 

Mundus  mens. 

With  regard  to  Bacon's  ancestral  home,  St.  Albans,  it  claims 
rivalry  with  the  City  of  York,  to  be  the  original  and  first  seat  of  Ma- 
sonry (and  even  of  the  Bardic  traditions,  connected  with  Glastonbury 
and  the  Arthurian  Legend)  in  England.  There  is  every  reason  to 
believe  Saint  Alban  was  the  real  founder  of  Masonry.  I,  therefore, 
give  here  some  account  of  the  manuscripts  of  Elias  Ashmole,  the 
Kosicrucian,  who  is  reported  to  have  been  one  of  the  members  of  the 
great  meeting  held  at  Warrington  in  1646  by  the  Masons,  when  they 
adopted  Bacon's  two  pillars. 

An  old  manuscript,  which  was  destroyed  with  many  others  in 
1720,  said  to  have  been  in  the  possession  of  Nicholas  Stone,  a  curious 
sculptor  under  Inigo  Jones,  contains  the  following  particulars  : 

*'  St.  Albans  loved  Masons  well,  and  cherished  them  much,  and 
made  their  pay  right  good ;  for  he  gave  them  2  shillings  per  weeli, 
and  3  pence  to  their  cheer;  whereas,  before  that  time,  in  all  the  land, 
a  Mason  had  but  a  penny  a  day,  and  his  meat,  until  St.  Albans 
mended  itt,  and  he  gott  them  a  charter  from  the  King  and  his 
counsell  for  to  hold  a  general  counscll,  and  gave  it  the  name  of 
assemblie.  Thereat  he  was  himselfe,  and  did  helpe  to  make  masons, 
and  gave  them  good  charges. " 

In  some  of  Mr.  Ashmole's  manuscripts  there  are  many  valuable 
collections  relating  to  the  History  of  the  Free  Masons,  as  may  be 
gathered  from  the  letters  of  Dr.  Knipe  (of  Christ  Church,  Oxford,)  to 
the  publisher  of  Ashmole's  life,  the  following  extracts  from  which 
will  authenticate  and  illustrate  many  facts  in  the  following  history : 

"  What  from  Mr.  Ashmole's  collection  I  could  gather,  was,  that  the 
report  of  our  Societies  taking  rise  from  a  bull  granted  by  the  Pope 
in  the  reign  of  Henry  VI.  to  some  Italian  architects  to  travel  over 
all  Europe  to  erect  chapels,  was  ill  founded.  Such  a  bull  there 
was;  and  those  architects  were  Masons.  But  this  bull,  in  the 
opinion  of  the  learned  Mr.  Ashmole,  was  confirmative  only,  and  did 
not  by  any  means  create  our  Fraternity,  or  even  establish  them  in 
this  kingdom.  But  as  to  the  time  and  manner  of  that  establishment 
something  I  shall  relate  from  the  same  collections. 

*'  St.  Alban,  the  protomartyr,  established  Masonry  here,  and 
from  his  time,  it  flourished,  more  or  less,  according  as  the  world 


202  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATURE. 

went,  down  to  the  days  of  King  Athelstane,  who,  for  the  sake  of  his 
brother  Edwin,  granted  the  Masons  a  charter. 

*'  Carausius,  a  Roman  general,  patronized  the  fraternity,  and 
encouraged  learning.  He  also  collected  the  best  artificers  from  many 
countries,  particularly  Masons.  He  appointed  Albanus,  his  steward, 
the  principal  superintendent  of  their  meetings.  Under  his  govern- 
ment, lodges  began  to  be  introduced,  and  the  business  of  Masonry 
regularly  carried  on.  They  obtained,  through  the  influence  of 
Albanus,  a  cliarter  from  Carausius  to  hold  a  general  council,  at 
which  Albanus  presided,  and  made  many  new  members.  This 
Albanus  was  the  celebrated  St.  Albans,  the  first  martyr  in  Britain 
for  the  Christian  faith. 

*'  In  the  year  557  A.  C,  when  St.  Austin  with  a  number  of 
monks,  among  whom  the  arts  had  been  preserved,  came  to  England. 
By  these  the  principles  of  Christianity  were  propagated  with  such  zeal, 
lliat  a  number  of  Kings  were  converted.  St.  Austin  then  became 
the  patron  of  the  order,  and  by  the  aid  of  foreigners  introduced  the 
(rothic  style  of  building.  He  appeared  at  the  head  of  the  fraternity 
in  founding  the  old  Cathedral  of  Canterbury,  in  the  year  600;  that 
of  Rochester  in  002;  St.  Paul's,  in  London,  in  604;  St.  Peter's,  in 
Westminster,  in  605;  as  well  as  many  others." 

In  the  Harleian  MSS.,  No.  2054,  Circa  A.  D.  1650 :— "  Of  the  many 
curious  old  MSS.  preserved  in  the  British  Museum,  the  Bodleian 
Library  at  Oxford,  etc.,  there  are  few  extant  more  interesting  to  the 
antiquarian  student  than  the  Harleian  MSS.  They  appeal  also  to 
us  as  Masons,  as  we  shall  endeavor  to  point  out.  Speaking  of 
Masonry,  the  author  or  authors  begins  with  a  dissertation  on  the 
seven  liberal  arts  and  sciences,  viz.:  "  Grammar,  Rhetoric,  Logic, 
Arithmetic,  Geometry,  Music,  and  Astronomy."  After  tracing 
Masonry  through  Noah  and  Moses  to  David  and  Solomon,  it  carries 
it  into  France  by  one  Nymus  Gra3cus,  who  had  been  at  the  building 
of  Solomon's  Temple.  From  France  it  takes  Masonry  into  England 
in  the  time  of  St.  Alban,  then  on  to  the  time  of  King  Athelstane. 
Reference  is  also  made  in  these  MSS.  to  Prince  Edwin,  therein  called 
Hadrian." 

I  find  Professor  Buhle,  in  his  Ur  sprung  und  ScMcksale  der  Or  den 
der  Bosenkreuzer  und  Freymaurer^  alluding  to  both  orders  as  having 
their  first  origin  in  England  : 

"  Allerdings  hat  die  altere  Geschichte  sowohl  des  Rosenkreuzer 
als  des  Maurerordens,  auch  wenn  man  gewisse  historische  Thatsa- 
chen  als  dahin  gehorig  erweisen  kann,  viele  Liicken,  zumal  was  das 
Detail  betrifift,  die  sich  bis  jetzt  iiberhaupt  nicht  ausfiillen  lassen,  oder 
die  ich  nicht  auszuflillen  vermag,  da  dieses  von  historischen  Docu- 
menten  uu'l  Nachrichten  abhangt,  die  wahrscheinlich  in  England  und 
Schottland,  den  ersten  Wohnsitsen  heider  Orden,  noch  hier  und  da  exis- 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE,  203 

tireu,  die  aber  mir  unbekannt  sind,  oder  die  ich,  falls  ich  auch  von 
diesen  und  jenen  eineliterarische  Notiz  gehabt  hatte,  nicht  beweisen 
konnte."     (p.  26,  1804.) 

I  now  give  the  conclusions  at  which  Frederick  Nicolai  arrived 
upon  the  same  subject : 

'^Dass  durch  die  Eosenkreuzerische  Physik,  und  durch 
Bacon's  Atalantis  veranlasst  (nach  welchen  beiden  die  physi- 
kalischen  Entdeckungen  sollten  gelieim  gehalten  werden,und  durch 
die  bildische  Sprache  der  damaligen  Chemiker  wirklich  geheim 
gehalten  wurden),  eine  Anzahl  von  verschiedenen  Personen  sich 
zusammengethan  habe,  um  eine  Gesellschaft  zu  errichten,  welche 
Bacon  in  dek  Atalantis  das  Salomonische  Haus  genannt 
HATTE,  d.  h.  eine  Gesellschaft  zu  errichten,  welche  die  Werke 
Gottes  in  der  Natur,  und  die  Ursachen  der  Dinge  zu  erforschen 
suchte."  (p.  61,  Einige  Bemerkungen  iiber  den  Ursprung  und  die 
Geschichte  der  Rosenkreuzer  und  Freymaurer,  1806.) 

Mr.  Soane  asserts  the  same  theory :  "  That  Freemasons  are 
either  deceived  or  deceivers,"  and  adds,  "  Their  society  sprang  out 
of  decayed  Rosicrucianism. " 

Let  me  here  state,  to  the  authority  and  opinion  of  Buhle  and 
Nicolai  can  be  added  the  German  philosophers  and  writers, 
Meiners,  Gatterer,  Dornden,  Semler,  and  other  mystics  of  the 
Eighteenth  Century,  who  each  and  all  held  up  Freemasonry  as  a 
branch  of  their  own  Rosicrucian  Cabala,  and  this  opinion  was  cor- 
roborated by  the  practice  of  Fustier,  Peuvret,  Pyron  and  others, 
who  knew  perfectly  the  actual  source  of  Freemasonry  in  the 
Knights  Templar  order,  through  the  secret  society  of  the  Rose,  which 
sprang  out  of  the  ruins  of  the  former,  rescued  by  one  faithful 
brother,  states  John  Valentine  Andreas.  This  we  can  well  believe, 
for  it  has  been  thoroughly  established  by  Rossetti  (in  his  Anti-papal 
Spirit  that  Preceded  the  Beformation),  that  Dante  has  been  initiated 
into  the  nine  degrees  or  rites  of  the  Templar  order.  That  is  why 
the  Divine  Comedy  is  so  full  of  mysticism  and  symbolism,  and  the 
introduction  of  the  Red  and  White  Rose,  points  out  the  source  of  the 
society,  known  later  by  the  name  of  the  Rosicrucians.  Somebody  at 
the  end  of  the  Sixteenth,  and  at  the  beginning  of  the  Seventeenth 
Centuries  (1603),  remodeled  in  England,  and  reconstructed  the 
society,  states  Robert  Fludd,  in  his  Tractatus  Apologeticus  (1617), 
wherein  he  takes  up  the  cudgels,  to  defend  the  society  against  the 
attacks  of  Libavius. 

In  1646  we  hear  of  a  meeting  or  lodge  held  at  Warrington, 
where  Elias  Ashmole,  the  celebrated  Rosicrucian,  is  present,  and 


204  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE, 

Bacon's  two  pillars,  with  their  globes  on  the  top  (known  to  every 
Mason),  are  adopted  and  his  New  Atlantis  discussed.  And  this  is 
the  first  authentic  and  trustworthy  evidence  we  possess  of  modern 
Freemasonry  and  its  origins.  De  Quincey  indorses  Buhle's  state- 
ment, that  Masonry  was  modified  Rosicrucianism  and  sprang  out  of 
it.  Buhle  and  Nicolai,  in  the  passages  in  German,  state  that 
probably  both  orders  had  their  dwelling-place  in  England  and 
Scotland,  (according  to  historical  documents  and  traditions,)  and 
that  Bacon's  Atlantis  or  Solomon^ s  House  was  the  original  of  the 
society.  What  made  Bacon  invent  his  Atlantis,  his  pillars,  and  the 
entire  scheme  ?  Masonry  did  not  exist  in  its  modern  form  in  his 
age.  My  opinion,  nay,  my  conviction,  I  may  say  is.  Bacon,  (a  pro- 
found student  of  Dante  and  Virgil,)  living  in  an  ancient  Masonic 
center  like  St.  Albans,  contemplated  the  revival  and  resuscitation 
of  a  secret  brotherhood  and  knightly  order,  borrowed  from  the 
Templars  and  their  mystic  Rose.  His  dialogue  of  A  Holy  War 
is  the  most  conclusive  possible  hint  for  the  Temple,  audits  peaceful 
soldiery,  possible  to  conceive.  It  proves,  beyond  doubt.  Bacon  was 
a  propagandist  for  the  reformation  and  the  restoring  of  man's 
fallen  condition. 

In  the  Sonnets  we  read :  — 

Was  it  the  proud  full  sail  of  his  great  verse, 
Bound  for  the  prize  of  all  too  precious  you. 
That  did  my  ripe  thoughts  in  my  brain  inhearse. 
Making  their  tomb  the  womb  wherein  they  grew  ? 

(Sonnet  Ixxxvi.) 
Of  Dante's  Divine  Comedy,  Blake  writes : 

"  This  poem  is  at  once  a  tomb  and  a  cradle, —  the  tomb  of  a  world 
that  was  passing, — the  cradle  of  the  world  that  was  to  come;  a  por- 
tico between  two  temples,  that  of  the  past 'and  that  of  the  future. 
In  it  are  deposited  the  traditions,  the  ideas,  the  sciences  of  the  past, 
as  the  Egyptians  deposited  their  kings  and  symbolic  Gods  in  the 
sepulchres  of  Thebes  and  Memphis.  The  future  brings  into  it,  its 
as[)irations  and  its  germs,  enveloped  in  the  swaddling  clothes  of  a 
rising  language,  and  a  splendid  poetry, —  a  mysterious  infant,  that  is 
nourished  by  the  two  teats  of  sacred  tradition,  and  profane  fiction, 
Moses  and  St.  Paul,  Homer  and  Virgil."  {Astronomical  Myths. 
Blake,  p.  307.) 

This  is  perfectly  true,  for  Dante  was  initiated  into  the  nine 
degrees  of  the  Knights  Templar,  who  were  the  Free  Masons,  so  to 
speak,  of  the  Middle  Ages,  and  who  from  their  travels  in  the  East, 
and  all  over  Europe,  had  become  the  guardians  of  the  secret 
doctrines  gathered  from  every  source,  and  which  eventually  passed 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUME.  205 

into  the  hands  of  the  Rosicrucians, —  a  society  ^^  formed  out  of  tlieir 
ruins  and  decay  hy  one  faithful  brother j^^  writes  John  Valentine 
Andreas,  their  reputed  head.  (Christ.  Mythol.)  Virgil  takes  up  the 
lighted  torch  of  Homer  and  hands  it  on  to  Dante,  who  passes  it  to 
the  genius  behind  the  Shakespeare  mask,  Francis  Bacon.  Thus  the 
"  handing  on  of  the  lamp  for  posterity,  ^^  has  been  kept  going,  by 
a  chain  of  giant  poets,  who,  like  the  distant  peaks  of  some  mighty 
range  of  Alps,  beckon  and  nod  to  each  other,  o'er  the  cloudland  of 
ignorance,  and  above  the  mists  of  the  ages.  No  wonder  Bacon  writes, 
*'  The  heathen  antiquities  are  like  Fame  Caput  inter  Nuhila  Condit, 
her  head  is  muffled  from  our  sight.^'  Dante's  Rose  of  Paradise 
shows  the  society  of  the  Rose  existed  in  his  age,  and  I  think  from 
Sonnet  86,  we  can  gather  a  hint,  Dante  (and  possibly  Virgil  also,), 
were  the  inspiring  sources  of  Francis  Bacon. 

Two  of  Michael  Maier's  works,  published  just  after  Shakespeare's 
death,  1616,  and  bearing  date  in  the  prefaces  September,  1616,  have 
for  titles  Lusus  Serius  and  Jocus  Severus.  My  opinion  is  these 
titles  refer  to  Bacchus  or  the  theatre,  which  indeed  is  made  up  of 
comedy  and  tragedy;  that  is,  of  the  jocose  and  the  grave,  the 
ridiculous  and  the  serious,  which  both  these  titles  indicate.  In 
Plato's  Cratylus  we  read : 

Herm.  But  what  will  you  say  concerning  Dionysius? 

Socrates.  You  inquire  about  great  things,  0  Son  of  Hipponicus. 
But  the  mode  of  nomination,  belonging  to  these  Divinities,  is  both 
Serious  and  Jocose. 

There  is  no  doubt,  in  both  of  these  works  by  Maier,  there  is  a 
serious  purpose  hidden  behind  the  allegories  or  fables,  in  wliich  he 
disguises  his  real  meaning. 

Ridentem  dicere  verum 

Quid  vetat  f 

In  Maier's  Jocus  Severus  we  find  the  title,  "  Tribunal  ^quum 
quo  Noctua  Regina  avium,  Phoenice  arbitro,  post  varias  discepta- 
tiones  et  querelas  volucrum  eam  infestantium  pronunciatur,  et  ob 
sapientiam  singularem,  Palladi  sacrata  agnoscitur."  (Francofurti, 
1617.)  The  dedicatory  epistle  concludes :  "  Babam  Francofurti 
ad  moenum  mense  Septembri,  Anno  1616,  transitu  ex  Anglia  in 
Bohemiam.^^  That  is  to  say,  it  was  written  evidently  in  England, 
and  this  preface  was  written  Jive  months  after  Shakespeare's  death. 
That  Maier  is  alluding,  by  his  chief  title,  to  tragedy  and  comedy 


20G  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

may  be  inferred  by  the  preface.    He  writes,  in  allusion  to  the  title 
Jocus  Severus : 

Vita  hominum  scena  est,  lususque,  aut  ludere  discas 
Cur  is  sepositis,  aut  miser  anda /eras.     (p.  3.) 

The  protagonist  of  the  piece  is  the  Owl,  who  being  persecuted 
by  other  birds,  refers  to  the  Phoenix,  as  a  tribunal  of  justice  upon 
the  question.  By  the  Owl  (Noctua)  I  understand  alchemy, — and 
the  fraternity  of  the  Rosycross,  who,  persecuted  by  the  age,  take 
refuge  in  night  and  occult  wisdom. 

"  Est  autem  Noctua  non  noctua,  sed  (de  mundanis  loquendo)  ars 
artiura  et  scientia  scientiarum,  chemia,  quas  a  diverso  hominum 
genere  quotidie  accusatur,  contumcliis  aflflcitur  et  couvitiis  pros- 
cinditur,  nempe  primo,  a  stultis,  stupidis,  indocilibus,  et  indoctis, 
quales  describuntur  sub  nomine  coruicis,  graculi,  pica?,  corvi,  anseris, 
hirundinis;  secundo  a  hteratisquidem,sed  rei  veritatis  ignaris,  iique 
denotantur  sub  nomine  philomele,  psittaci,  gruis;  tertio  ab  avnritia 
prseoccupatis,  mente  improba,  cervice  dura,  nimis  credulis,  incon- 
stantibus  et  sumptus  expeudere  deti-ahentibus,  qui  signiflcantur  i)er 
CLiculum,  monedulam,  picum,  ardeam.  Noctua  dicitur,  quia  in  tene- 
bris  vivit,  multisque  uoctium  laboribus  acquiritur,  de  qua,  Avicenna 
{lib.  de  anima  diet.  6  cap.  17)  ^  Ego  hoc  totum,^  inquit  didici  fre- 
quenter legendo,  et  parum  dormiendo,  et  parum  comedendo  et  minus 
bibendo,  et  quantum  expeuderunt  socii  mei  in  lumine  potandum 
vinum  de  nocte,  tantum  ego  expendi  ad  vigilandum  et  legendum  de 
nocte  in  oleo,  et  quantum  expendebant  in  couversione,  amplius 
expendebam  ego  in  lumine  ad  vigilandum,  et  discendum  de  nocte, 
et  nisi  hoc  facerem,  non  scirem  de  magisterio. " 

''  Quae  vero  causa  fuerit,  cur  Noctua  Palladis  et  sapientise  avis 
Athenarumque  doctissimarum  quondam  propria  fuerit,  eruditis  forte 
inolevit,  licet  vulgo  fortuitum  quid  videatur.  Eadem  certe  nobis  in 
proposito  est,  cui  Noctuara  Reginam  Avium  dignemur  et  indigite- 
mus.  Phoenix  vero  illi  judex  appellatur,  nempe  ex  avium  genere 
justissimus  et  opulentissimus,  ne  quid  in  gratiam  illarum  aut  odium 
hujus  dicat :  qui  an  unquam,  qualis  putatur,  vixerit,  an  vero  alio 
modo,  cuilibet  disquirendum  relinquo.  Qualis  autem  fuisse  haec 
avis  credita  sit  antiquis  temporibus,  ex  Tacito  hue  adscribam.  Is 
{lib.  6  annalium)  sic  narrat.  Anno  urbis  787  Paulo  Fabio  L.  Vitellis 
Coss.  post  longum  seculorum  ambitum  avis  Phoenix  in  ^gyptum 
venit,  pra3buitque  materiam  doctissimus  indigenarum  et  graecorum 
multa  super  res  miraculo  disserendi :  de  quibus  congruunt,  et  plura 
ambigua  sed  cognitu  non  absurd  a  promere  libet. " 

In  some  of  Bacon's  Latin  works  there  are  a  great  number  of 
ornamental  headpieces   or   colophonS;  and  the  first  letter  (com- 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATUBE.  2?? 

mencing  chapters  and  books)  of  the  first  word  and  hne,  are  bor- 
rowed from  scriptural  things.  A  favorite  one  is  David  playing  on 
his  harp,  which  recalls  the  49th  Psalm,  (4) : 

"  Hear  this  all  ye  people;  give  ear  all  ye  inhabitants  of  the  world : 
both  low  and  high,  rich  and  poor  together,  my  mouth  shall 
speak  of  wisdom,  and  tbe  meditation  of  my  heart  shall  be  of  under- 
standing. I  WILL  INCLINE  MY  EAK  TO  A  PAKABLE  ;  I  WILL  OPEN 
MY  DARK  SAYINGS  UPON  THE  HAKP. " 

So,  upon  page  56  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning,  1640,  repro- 
duced, there  are  the  words  Verba  Sapientum  sunt  tanquam  aculei,  et 
tanquam  clavi  in  altum  defixi.  (Eccles.  12.)  The  words  of  the 
wise  are  as  goads  and  as  nails  fixed  in.  Of  course  this  means^  that 
profound  wisdom,  always  contains  something  in  its  words  to  excite 
our  curiosity,  and  stimulate  our  minds,  to  search  out  the  keys  and 
secrets  written  in  the  depths  of  its  dark  profundities  (altum),  like 
stars,  (or  even,  keys,)  far  off  in  the  Heavens.  All  this  applies  to 
Bacon's  entire  works.  They  have  been  written  with  the  double 
purpose  of  obscuration  and  revelation,  and  can  be  best  compared  to 
the  Bible,  and  particularly  the  wisdom  of  Solomon  and  David's 
Psalms.  It  is  useless  to  approach  Bacon's  w^orks  from  the  stand- 
point of  common  sense,  or  as  an  open  problem.  They  are  purely 
esoteric  and  spiritual,  profoundly  dark,  and  obscurely  written,  and 
he  must  indeed  be  a  Delian  Diver,  who  hopes  to  pluck  out  the  heart 
of  the  mystery,  save  by  illumination,  which  latter  is  a  species  of 
intellectual  instinct,  or  intuition,  sharpened  by  practice  and  mental 
discipline. 

Everybody  w^ho  knows  the  least  bit  in  the  world  about  Free- 
masonry will  allow  Lord  Bacon  was  a  Mason.  His  pillars  or 
columns  prove  that.    De  Quincey  writes : 

''  The  two  pillars,  also,  Jachin  and  Boaz  (strength  and  power), 
which  are  amongst  the  memorable  singularities  in  Solomon's 
temple,  have  an  occult  meaning  to  the  Free-masons,  which,  how- 
ever, I  shall  not  undertake  publicly  to  explain.  This  symbohc 
interest  to  the  Enghsh  Eosicrucians  in  the  attributes,  incidents  and 
legends  of  the  art  exercised  by  the  literal  Masons  of  real  life,  natur- 
ally brought  the  two  orders  into  some  connection  with  each  other. 
They  were  thus  enabled  to  realize  to  their  eyes  the  symbols  of  their 
allegories;  and  the  same  building  which  accommodated  the  guild  of 
builders  in  their  professional  meetings,  offered  a  desirable  means  of 
secret  assemblies  to  the  early  Free-masons.  An  apparatus  of  imple- 
ments and  utensils  such  as  were  presented  in  the  fabulous  sepulchre 
of  Father  Rosycross,  were  here  actually  brought  together.  And 
accordingly,  it  is  upon  record  that  the  first  formal  and  solemn  lodge 


208  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

of  Freemasons,  on  occasion  of  which  the  very  name  of  Free-masons 
was  first  publicly  made  known,  was  held  in  Mason's  Hall,  Mason's 
alley,  Basinghall  street,  London,  in  the  year  1646.  Into  this  lodge 
it  was  that  Ashmole,  the  antiquary,  was  admitted.  Private  meet- 
ings there  may  doubtless  have  been  before,  and  one  at  Warrington 
(half-way  between  Liverpool  and  Manchester)  is  expressly  men- 
tioned in  the  life  of  Ashmole;  but  the  name  of  a  Free-masons' 
Lodge,  with  all  the  insignia,  attributes  and  circumstances  of  a 
locge,  first  came  forward  in  the  page  of  history  on  the  occasion  I 
have  mentioned.  It  is,  perhaps,  in  requital  of  the  services  at  that 
time  rendered  in  the  loan  of  their  hall,  etc.,  that  the  guild  of 
Masons  as  a  body,  and  where  they  are  not  individually  objection- 
able, enjoy  a  precedency  of  all  orders  of  men  in  the  right  to  admis- 
sion, and  pay  only  half  fees.  Ashmole,  by  the  way,  whom  I  have 
just  mentioned  as  one  of  the  earliest  Free-masons,  appears  from  his 
wiitings  to  have  been  a  zealous  Rosicrucian. "  {Essay  on  Bosi- 
crucians. ) 

For  the  account  of  these  columns  or  pillars  see  the  First  Book  of 
Kings  vii.  14-22,  where  it  is  said,  "  And  upon  the  top  of  the 
pillars,  was  Lily  work."  Compare:  ''And  he  reared  up  the  pil- 
lars before  the  temple,  one  on  the  right  hand,  and  the  other  on  the 
left;  and  called  the  name  of  that  on  the  right  hand  Jachin,  and  the 
name  of  that  on  the  left  Boaz."  (Chronicles  II.,  chap.  iii.  17.)  This 
proves  Bacon's  entire  Instauration  is  the  House  of  Wisdom,  as 
indeed  Archbishop  Tenison  twice  states  in  his  Baconiana,  1679. 
(See  Francis  Bacon.) 

I  have  stated  in  my  last  work  {Francis  Bacon),  that  most  of  the 
Rosicrucian  literature  appeared  (and  most  certainly  the  Rosicrucian 
mania  was  at  its  height,)  about  the  date  of  Shakespeare's  death, 
1616.    Here  is  the  proof: 

''  The  sensation  which  was  produced  throughout  Germany  by  the 
works  in  question,  is  sufficiently  evidenced,  by  the  repeated  editions 
of  them,  which  appeared  between  1614  and  1617,  but  still  more  by  the 
prodigious  commotion  which  followed  in  the  literary  world.  In  the 
library  at  Gottingen,  there  is  a  body  of  letters,  addressed  to  the 
imaginary  order  of  Father  Rosycross,  from  1614  to  1617,  by  persons, 
offering  themselves  as  members."  {De  Quincey^s  Essay.) 

Again : 

"  To  a  hoax  played  off  by  a  young  man  of  extraordinary  talents 
in  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century  {i.e.,  about  1610-14),  but 
for  a  more  elevated  purpose  than  most  hoaxes  involve,  the  reader  will 
find  that  the  whole  mysteries  of  Free-masonry,  as  now  existing  all 
over  the  civilized  world,  after  a  lapse  of  more  than  two  centuries, 
are  here  distinctly  traced :  such  is  the  power  of  a  grand  and  capa- 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  209 

cious  aspiration  of  philosophic  benevolence  to  embalm  even  the 
idlest  levities,  as  amber  enshrines  straws  and  insects !  "  {Ih.) 

"  Thus  I  have  traced  the  history  of  Rosicrucianism  from  its  birth 
in  Germany;  and  have  ended  with  showing  that,  from  the  ener- 
getic opposition  and  ridicule  which  it  latterly  incurred,  no  college 
or  lodge  of  Rosicrucian  brethren,  professing  occult  knowledge,  and 
communicating  it  under  solemn  forms  and  vows  of  secresy,  can  be 
shown  from  historical  records  to  have  been  ever  established  in  Ger- 
many. I  shall  now  undertake  to  prove  that  Rosicrucianism  was  trans- 
planted to  England,  where  it  flourished  under  a  new  name,  under 
which  name  it  has  been  since  re-exported  to  us  in  common  with  the 
other  countries  of  Christendom.  For  I  affirm,  as  the  main  thesis  of 
my  concluding  labors,  that  free-masonry  is  neither  more  nor 

LESS  than  rosicrucianism  as  modified  by  those  who  trans- 
planted it  to  ENGLAND. "      [lb.) 

This  is  a  thesis  difficult  to  prove,  because  there  exists  abundant 
evidence  St.  Alban  cherished  Free  Masons,  and  that  it  existed  in 
King  Henry  the  Sixth's  reign.  I  should  here  do  well  to  caution  the 
student  against  taking  De  Quincey  as  an  absolute  authority  upon 
this  subject.  His  essay  upon  the  Rosicrucians  and  Free  Masons 
seems  a  very  recondite  and  exhaustive  study  to  the  uninitiated.  So 
I  once  thought  myself,  and  I  dare  say  thousands  have  read  the 
essay,  with  the  idea,  De  Quincey  had  deeply  read  himself  up  upon 
the  subject.  I  happened,  however,  to  come  across  Ruble's  famous 
Dissertation  (read  by  the  professor  in  1803,  to  the  Society  of 
Gottingen)  upon  this  subject,  and  I  recognized  at  once  the  source 
of  De  Quincey's  information  and  inspiration.  In  short,  De  Quincey's 
essay  is  entirely  borrowed  from  Buhle,  even  to  the  learned  foot-notes, 
and  I  question,  De  Quincey  had  ever  read  any  of  the  genuine  and  real 
Rosicrucian  literature  for  himself  at  all.  De  Quincey  cuts  up  Buhle's 
dissertation,  as  the  Abyssinian  is  reported  to  do  with  regard  to  the 
living  animal,  carves  a  steak,  helps  himself,  and  tortures  his  subject, 
without  killing  him.  De  Quincey  contradicts  himself,  and  is  just 
as  confused  over  his  subject  as  Buhle  whom  he  ridicules  for  this 
identical  reason.  De  Quincey  tells  us  of  the  lodge  meeting  at 
Warrington  in  1646,  but  omits  to  state  what  Oliver  (in  his 
Discrepancies  of  Freemasonry)  adds,  that  Bacon's  New  Atlantis  was 
there  discussed  and  his  pillars  adopted.  This  proves  Bacon's  Rosi- 
crucian (or  at  least  Masonic)  affiliations,  and  it  gives  the  evidence 
all  in  favor  of  Nicolai,  Buhle  and  many  other  German  writers  on 
this  subject. 

In  Bacon's  Resuscitatio,  1671,  there  are  certain  psalms  translated 

14 


210  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE. 

by  him,  I  am  of  the  belief,  with  the  purport  of  Masonic  symbolism. 
For  example,  the  137th  Psalm  is  translated  by  Bacon,  and  this 
psalm  is  part  of  the  reception  or  rite  of  the  degree  of  super-excellent 
master  in  cryptic  Masonry : 

''  When  as  we  sat  all  sad  and  desolate 
By  Babylon  upon  the  river's  side. 
Eased  from  the  tasks,  which  .in  our  captive  state 
We  were  enforced  daily  to  abide, 
Our  harps  we  had  brought  with  us  to  the  field 
Some  solace  to  our  heavy  souls  to  yield.'' 

(Resuscitatio,  1671.) 

In  Mackey's  Cryptic  Masonry  he  gives  this  verse  as  part  of  the 
reception  into  the  degree  mentioned,  thus : 

By  Babel's  stream  we  sit  and  weep; 

Our  tears  for  Zion  flow  ; 
Our  harps  on  drooping  willows  sleep;  * 

Our  hearts  are  filled  with  woe. 
(p.  83  Cryptic  Masonry  Manual  of  the  Council,  1867.) 

Here,  let  me  state,  I  am  not  a  Freemason,  and  have  never  been 
one  at  any  time,  or  taken  any  degree  whatever.  I  am,  therefore, 
under  no  consciousness  of  betraying  any  secrets  of  the  craft. 

THE  ACORN  ORNAMENT. 

An  Acorn  ornament  in  the  headpieces  of  Bacon's  works  is  very 
frequent  and  conspicuous,  found  often  with  colon  dots  and  'notes  of 
interrogation.  A  little  work  entitled  Historical  Memoirs  on  the 
Eeigns  of  Queen  Elizabeth  and  King  James,  fell  into  my  hands,  of 
date  1658,  and  in  this  work  appears  exactly  the  same  head  orna- 
ments as  in  Tennyson's  Baconiana  (1679),  with  a  single  Acorn  in 
the  center.  In  the  Epistle  to  Lucilius  I  found  this  (in  curious 
mixture  of  italics  and  non-italicized  words) : 

**  So  far  as  the  stationer's  mere  zeal  to  gain,  rather  than  any 
propensity  to  the  advancement  of  learning,  did  for  a  while  keep 
Bacon,  Rawleigh  and  divers  incomparable  spirits  more  from  perish- 
ing at  the  bottom  of  oblivion,  good  books  (anciently  written  in  the 
bark  of  trees,)  and  now  turning  in  their  progress,  so  exactly  the 
fate  of  Acorns,  that  if  their  chance  be  to  withstand  the  sivinish 
contamination  of  their  own  age,  and  trampling  into  the  dirt  of  con- 
tempt, they  do  not  seldom  afterwards  become  the  gods  of  the 
nations  and  have  temples  dedicated  to  their  worship.  As  their 
authors,  in  this  participate  with  other  good  men,  who  attain  not  to 
a  state  of  glory  till  after  this  life." 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITERATURE.  211 

Now  this  is  very  curious.  Because  the  Acorn  parable  is  the  one 
of  "  cast  not  your  pearls  before  swine, "  which  we  find  so  fully 
expressed  in  Sir  Philip  Sidney's  frontispiece  to  the  Countess  of 
Pembroke's  Arcadia,  viz.,  the  picture  of  a  pig  smelling  some 
flowers;  on  a  scroll  of  which  is  written :  "  Non  tibi  Spiro,^^ — I  do 
not  breathe  for  thee. 

It  shows  that  this  Acorn  mark  was  a  sign  for  the  initiated  of 
some  secret  society,  who  cast  their  pearls  (acorns)  before  the  swine, 
guarded  by  a  cipher,  written  within,  of  which  this  Acorn  was 
probably  the  emblem.  This  little  book  (by  Francis  Osborn)  con- 
tains some  **  Political  Deductions  from  the  History  of  the  Earl  of 
Essex,  executed  under  Queen  Elizabeth."  Seeing  that  Bacon 
played  a  great  part  as  the  friend  of  Essex,  and  "finally  was  his  state 
prosecutor,  and  further  seeing  Bacon's  name  is  introduced  in  con- 
text with  the  Advancement  of  Learning,  and  the  Acorn  simile,  it 
must  indeed  strike  the  profound  critic  that  this  Acorn  mark,  which 
we  reflnd  only  in  particular  works  (like  Boccalini's  Ragguagli  di 
Parnasso)  has  something  in  it.  The  reader  will  find  this  Acorn 
ornament  in  many  works  of  Lord  Bacon's,  and  on  page  271, 
Advancement  of  Learning,  with  cipher  context. 


/ 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

GOEHAMBURY  AND  VeRULAM. 

Bare  niin'd  choirs,  where  late  the  sweet  birds  sang. 

(Sonnet  LXXIII.) 

Ruskin  writes  of  the  stars  of  Virgil,  or  of  the  Spring : 

*'  Those  stars  are  called  not  only  Pleiades,  but  VergihaB,  from  a 
word  mingling  the  ideas  of  the  turning  and  returning  of  spring-time 
with  the  outpouring  of  rain.  The  mother  of  Virgil,  bearing  the 
name  of  Maia,  Virgil  himself  received  his  name  from  the  seven  stars, 
and  he  in  forming  first  the  mind  of  Dante,  and  thi'ough  him  that  of 
Chaucer,  became  the  fountain-head  of  all  the  best  literary  power 
connected  with  the  love  of  vegetative  nature  among  civilized  races  of 
men.  Take  the  fact  for  what  it  is  worth  ;  still  it  is  a  strange  seal 
of  coincidence;  in  word  and  in  reality,  upon  the  Greek  dream  of  the 
power  over  human  life,  and  its  purest  thoughts,  in  the  stars  of 
spring.  But  the  first  syllable  of  the  name  of  Virgil  has  relation  also 
to  another  group  of  woids,  of  which  the  English  ones.  Virtue  and 
Virgin  bring  down  the  force  to  modern  days.  It  is  a  group  contain- 
ing mainly  the  idea  of  spring  or  increase  of  life  in  vegetation, — the 
rising  of  the  new  branch  of  the  tree  out  of  the  bud,  and  of  the  new 
leaf  out  of  the  ground.  It  involves  secondarily  the  idea  of  green- 
ness and  of  strength,  but,  primarily,  that  of  living  increase  of  a  new 
rod  from  a  stock,  stem  or  root;  (^  There  shall  come  forth  a  rod  out 
of  the  stem  of  Jesse'),  and  chiefly  the  stem  of  certain  plants — either 
of  the  rose  tribe,  as  in  the  budding  of  the  almond  rod  of  Aaron;  or 
of  the  olive  tribe."  {The  Queen  of  the  Air,  pp.  43-44.) 

It  is  very  curious  to  find  Bacon's  home  on  the  banks  of  the  river 
Ver(or  the  spring),  and  his  title  of  Lord  Verulam  connected  with  it. 
For  Verulam  (the  modernized  form  of  the  Latin  Verulamium)  simply 
means  the  town  on  the  river  Ver. ,  Indeed,  during  Bacon's  lifetime, 
he  built  himself  a  house  upon  the  river  itself,  behind  the  Byzantine 
fish  ponds,  which  were  fed  by  the  river.  And  he  gave  this  mansion 
the  name  of  Verulam  House.  It  was  here  he  wrote  his  St/lva  Sylvar- 
um,  and  spent  the  greater  part  of  the  last  five  years  of  his  life,  in  the 
company  of  men  like  Hobbes  and  Eawley,  his  chaplain.  One  wing 
or  gable  of  the  house  still  stands.  The  Pleiades,  or  the  stars  of 
spring,  are  a  group  of  stars  closely  connected  with  the  lost  island 
of  Atlantis.  For  their  names  are  each  called  after  one  of  the 
seven  daughters  of  Atlas,  known  as  the  Atlantides.    Bacon  writes: 

"  Canst  thou  bind  the  sweet  influences  of  Pleiades,  or  loose  the 
bands  of  Orion  ?   Where  the  settled  and  immovable  configuration  of 

212 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  213 

the  first  stars,  ever  standing  at  equal  distance,  is  with  great  elegancy 
described."  So  in  another  place,  ''  Which  maketh  Arcturus,  Orion 
and  Pleiades,  and  the  secret  chambers  of  the  south.  Where  he 
(Job)  again  points  at  the  depression  of  the  Southern  Pole,  design- 
ing it  by  the  name  of  the  Secrets  of  the  South. "  (p.  44  Advancement 
of  Learning,  1640.) 

Halliwell  Phillips  writes:  "According  to  Matthew  Paris,  the 
story  of  St.  Catherine  was  dramatized  about  the  commencement  of 
the  twelfth  century,  by  one  Geoffrey,  a  learned  Norman  then  in 
England,  in  a  play  which  was  acted  at  Dunstable  at  that  period. 
This  is  the  earliest  notice  of  the  drama  in  this  country  which  has 
been  discovered."  (p.  321,  Outlines  of  Shakespeare's  Life.)  This 
Geoffrey  was  Geoffrey  de  Gorham,  a  bishop  of  St.  Albans,  who 
built  Gorhambury  Abbey,  and  from  which  Bacon's  seat  and  park 
borrowed  its  name.  In  fact,  the  earliest  notice  of  the  drama  in 
England  takes  us  to  Temple  House,  Bacon's  home,  built  within  a 
stone's  throw  of  the  site  of  Geoffrey  de  Gorham's  abbey.  This, 
to  those  who  believe  in  the  Baconian  theory  of  the  authorship  of 
the  plays,  must  appear  very  remarkable,  almost  fatality.  Indeed, 
there  are  many  trifles  in  the  history  of  St.  Albans  connected  with 
Bacon,  which  appear  as  almost  omens  or  portents  pointing  to 
Bacon.  His  final  title.  Viscount  St.  Albans,  appears  to  have 
impressed  itself  upon  his  mind,  for  he  wrote,  just  after  obtaining  it 
in  1621,  "  I  may  now  be  buried  in  Saint  Albans  habit,  as  he  lived, " 
probably  a  profound  hint  for  Bacon's  literary  and  political 
martyrdom,  as  a  parallel  for  the  death  of  the  martyr  saint,  who  was 
put  to  death  on  the  site  of  the  abbey. 

The  man  who  possessed  the  best  head  that  the  world  has  as  yet 
seen,  and  whose  brain  was  actually  concentric  with  the  universe, 
died  under  a  strange  roof,  almost  alone  and  friendless. 

"  No  ministering  hands  of  feminine  love  soothed  his  fevered 
brow,  moistened  his  parched  lips;  no  gentle  woman's  voice,  modu- 
lated by  sympathy  and  sorrow,  fell  upon  his  ear.  He  was  worse 
than  wifeless,  for  the  alderman's  daughter,  the  '  handsome  maiden  to 
his  liking,'  had  not  shared  his  sorrows;  she  was  gone  from  him, 
living  upon  an  allowance  spared  with  difficulty  from  his  narrow 
means.  It  is  said  she  was  faithless;  at  any  rate,  she  honored  the 
memory  of  the  great  philosopher,  by  marrying  'her  gentleman- 
usher',  ere  the  funeral  baked  meats  grew  cold.  Bacon  was  not  only 
worse  than  wifeless;  he  was  without  children." 

This  opinion  rests  upon  the  following  extract  from  his  will,  the 
inference  of  his  biographer,  and  perhaps,  traditional  gossip : 


214  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE, 

*'  Whatsoever  I  have  given,  granted,  confirmed,  or  appointed  to 
my  wife  in  the  former  part  of  this  will  I  do  now,  for  just  and  great 
causes,  utterly  revoke  and  make  void,  and  leave  to  her  her  right 
only."    {Francis  Bacon,  p.  169.    B.  G.  Lovejoy.) 

There  is  something  awful  in  the  reflection  that  this  great  man, 
who  sacrificed  himself  for  the  cause  of  humanity,  died  alone,  almost 
friendless,  the  Christ  of  literature,  upon  the  day  of  the  resurrection 
of  our  Lord !  There  does  not  exist  even  an  account  of  his  burial 
or  funeral !  All  is  mystery, —  mystery  which  repeats  itself  around 
Shakespeare  as  well. 

Aubrey  observes : 

^''  All  that  were  great  and  good  loved  and  honored  Mm,  '*  Professor 
Playfair  said :  "He  is  destined  to  remain  an  instantia  singularis 
among  men,  and  as  he  had  no  rival  in  the  times  which  are  past,  so  he 
is  likely  to  have  none  in  those  which  are  to  come.  Before  any  par- 
allel to  him  can  be  found,  not  only  must  a  man  of  the  same  talents 
be  produced,  but  he  must  be  placed  in  the  same  circumstances,  the 
memory  of  his  predecessor  must  be  effaced,  and  the  light  of 
science,  after  being  entirely  extinguished,  must  be  again  beginning 
to  revive.  If  a  second  Bacon  is  ever  to  arise,  he  must  be  ignorant 
of  the  first." 

Aubrey  relates  how  Bacon  would  often  drink  a  good  draught  of 
strong  March-beer,  to  lay  his  working  fancy  asleep,  which,  other- 
wise, would  keep  him  awake  the  greater  part  of  the  night  {Aubrey, 
vol.  II.,  pp.  223,  226,  235).  This  is  a  considerable  proof  of  the 
Imaginative  character  of  his  mind,  and  shows  the  poet  behind  the 
philosopher. 

Thomas  Fuller  (in  his  Worthies)  relates  as  follows : 

''  Since  I  have  read,  that  his  grave  being  occasionally  opened,  his 
skull  (the  relic  of  civil  veneration),  was  by  one  King,  a  Doctor  of 
Physic,  made  the  object  of  scorn  and  contempt ;  but  he  who  then 
derided  the  dead,  has  since  become  the  laughing-stock  of  the 
living. " 

This  cited  by  a  correspondent  in  Notes  and  Queries  (2d  S., 
viii.  354),  elicited  from  Mr.  C.  Le  Poer  Kennedy,  of  St.  Albans,  an 
account  of  a  search  that  had  been  made  for  Bacon's  remains,  on  the 
occasion  of  the  interment  of  the  last  Lord  Verulam.  "  A  partition 
wall  was  pulled  down,  and  the  search  extended  into  the  part  of  the 
vault  immediately  under  the  monument,  but  no  remains  were 
found. " 

Mrs.  Henry  Pott  related  to  me,  how  she  was  informed  by  Lord 
Yerulam,  of  an  attempt  to  carry  away  Bacon's  monument  from 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  215 

Saiut  Michael's  Church,  Saint  Albans, — the  monument  being  found 
detached  from  its  niche,  and  lying  with  a  broken  leg  under  the  chan- 
cel window.  The  robbers,  who  planned  this  mysterious  sacrilege,  evi- 
dently had  hoped  to  have  lifted  the  statue  through  the  window,  but 
found  it  too  heavy,  and  had  to  relinquish  their  task.  The  mystery 
attached  to  Bacon,  applies  also  to  Shakespeare's  grave.  Washington 
Irving  relates,  that  the  old  sexton  who  made  bold  to  peep  through 
a  partition  hole  into  Shakespeare's  grave,  saw  neither  dust  or 
bones. 

Doctor  Ingleby  writes  {Shakespeare^ s  Bones,  p.  31) : 

"  In  the  year  1796,  the  supposed  grave  (of  Shakespeare),  was 
actually  broken  into,  in  the  course  of  digging  a  vault  in  its  imme- 
diate proximity;  and  not  much  more  than  fifty  years  ago,  the  slab 
over  the  grave,  having  sunk  below  the  level  of  the  pavement,  was 
removed,  the  surface  was  leveled,  and  a  fresh  stone  was  laid  over 
the  old  bed.  It  is  certain,  I  believe,  that  the  original  stone  did 
not  bear  the  name  of  Shakespeare,  any  more  than  its  successor, 
but  it  is  not  certain  that  the  fourlines  appear  upon  the  new  stone  in 
exactly  the  same  literal  form  as  they  did  upon  the  old  one.  ( Tradi- 
tionary Anecdotes  of  Shakespeare,  1883,  p.  11.)  I  wish  I  could  add 
that  these  two  were  the  only  occasions  when  either  grave  or  grave- 
stone was  meddled  with.  I  am  informed,  on  the  authority  of  a  free 
and  accepted  Mason,  that  a  brother  Mason  of  his,  has  explored  the 
grave  which  purports  to  be  Shakespeare's,  and  that  he  found 
nothing  in  it  but  dust." 

In  Baconiana  (1679)  we  read  of  Bacon : 

"  Such  great  wits  are  not  the  common  Birth  of  Time ;  and  they, 
surely,  intended  to  signify  so  much  who  said  of  the  Phoenix  (though 
in  hyperbole  as  well  as  metaphor),  that  Nature  gives  the  World  that 
individual  species  but  once  in  five  hundred  years." 

Amongst  the  curious  pieces  in  this  work  are  some  verses  by  Abra- 
ham Cowley,  who,  Mrs.  Henry  Pott  tells  me,  was  cipherer  to  the  king. 
He  compares  Bacon  to  Beubens  and  Vandyke,  calls  his  words  "pict- 
ures of  the  thought,^^  and  describes  Bacon  as  gathering  bunches  of 
grapes  and  extracting  the  juice  from  them. 

"  Like  foolish  birds  to  painted  grapes  we  flew. 
He  sought  and  gather'd  for  our  use  the  true ; 
And  when,  on  heaps,  the  chosen  bunches  lay. 
He  pressed  them  wisely  the  mechanic  way, 
'Till  all  their  juice  did,  in  one  vessel  pQur, 
Ferment  into  a  nourishment  divine, 
The  thirsty  soul's  refreshing  wine. " 

It  must  be  owned  that  this  is  a  close  approximation  to  the  subject 
of  the  Drama,  to  Bacchus  and  the  Dionysian  Festivals  around  the 


216  THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEJRATUME. 

autumnal  wine  presses.  Bacchus,  it  need  hardly  be  stated,  was  not 
only  God  of  the  Grape,  but  it  was  around  his  worship  at  the  time  of 
the  vintage  that  the  drama  first  took  its  origin  in  songs  sung  in 
praise  of  the  wine  {Donaldson^s  Greek  Theatre). 

"  Who  to  the  life  an  exact  piece  would  make 
Must  not  from  others'  work  a  copy  take ; 
No,  not  from  Beubens  or  Vandyke  ; 
Much  less  content  himself  to  make  it  like 
Th'  ideas  and  the  images  which  lie 
In  his  own  fancy,  or  his  memory."    (Cowley.) 

In  a  prayer,  or  psalm,  composed  by  Bacon,  and  to  be  found  on 
page  17  of  the  Hesuscitatio  (1670),  he  writes :  "  I  have,  though  in  a 
DESPISED  WEED,  procured  the  good  of  all  men." 

Now,  the  student  will  note  this  is  exactly  the  same  language  he 
uses  for  poetry,  upon  page  264  cited :  "  As  for  poesy  (whether  we 
speak  of  fables  or  meter),  it  is,  as  we  have  said  before,  as  a  lux- 
uriant HERB,  brought  forth  without  seed  "  (p.  264).  The  original 
Latin  text  of  the  De  Augmentis,  gives  luxurians  herba,  which 
means  rank  or  luxuriant  grass,  or  weeds.  Bacon  evidently  intends 
to  hint  his  own  poetry  differs  from  other  poetry,  in  that  it  contains 
spiritual  seed,  a  doctrine  which,  as  Proserpine  or  spirit,  may  be 
refound  everywhere  in  his  Sylva  Sylvarum  and  Advancement.  It  is 
the  philosophy  of  the  Sonnets;  that  is,  store  for  the  sake  of  a  new 
harvest,  and  for  a  second  immortality  through  interpretation  and 
growth  of  these  seeds  sown  in  our  minds  by  his  text.  The  modern 
critic  quite  forgets,  the  art  of  the  playwright  was  considered  a 
despised  weed,  in  Bacon's  age,  as  is  testified  by  abundance  of  evi- 
dence. The  literary  encomiums  given  Shakespeare  by  his  contem- 
poraries, are  simply  the  praises  poets  gave  each  other,  but  speak 
nothing  for  the  general  public,  or  society  standing  of  the  poet 
playwright.  The  lives  of  Greene,  Marlow,  speak  volumes  for  my 
theory.  Selden  declared  "  It  would  be  impossible  for  a  lord  to 
write  verses,"  and  for  a  man  in  Bacon's  position,  whose  legal 
career  depended  upon  soUd  character  and  rational  learning,  to 
have  figured  as  a  play  writer,  would  have  exposed  him  to  the  mercy 
of  his  enemies  and  ruined  him  in  Elizabeth's  eyes,  to  say  nothing 
that  the  writing  of  such  treasonable  plays  as  Henry  the  Fourth 
would  have  taken  him  to  the  Tower,  as  it  did,  indeed,  Hay  ward 
for  the  same  thing.  Everlastingly  critics  cry  out,  *'Why  did  not 
Bacon  acknowledge  his  writings  f  "  If  he  had  it  is  certain  he  would 
never  have  died  Viscount  St.  Albans,  or  been  Lord  Keeper  I    The 


THE  COLUMBUS  OF  LITEBATUBE.  217 

critic  thinks  of  the  modern  standing  of  the  actor,  he  sees  the  stage 
ennobled  to  an  art,  the  theatre  a  splendid  structure  of  magnificence, 
the  drama  now  on  a  level  with  all  that  is  best  in  literature,  and 
acknowledged  (as  a  profession)  in  society, — but  he  does  not  see  the 
Globe,  or  the  Fortune,  the  Bose,  or  the  Curtain,  as  they  once  stood, 
mere  cockpits  full  of  gods  and  apple-gnawing  rabble,  seated  on  rude 
benches,  and  the  structures  themselves  (like  the  Globe)  mere 
mountebank  edifices,  as  they  are  represented  in  engravings  and 
woodcuts  handed  down  to  us  !  Poetry  and  playwriting  in  the  serv- 
ice of  the  court,  as  the  composition  of  masques  and  barriers,  might 
raise  a  man  like  Ben  Jonson,  who  had  been  a  bricklayer,  or  even  a 
reputed  Shakespeare,  but  it  would  degrade  a  nephew  of  Lord  Bur- 
leigh, a  son  of  Queen  Elizabeth's  Lord  Keeper,  an  aspirant  at  court 
and  on  the  bench, —  a  man  whose  mother,  Lady  Anne  Bacon,  held 
every  eccentricity  in  abhorrence,  with  the  severity  of  a  straight- 
laced  rigid  puritan.  Even  Bacon's  splendid  talents  and  prose  writ- 
ings raised  the  voices  of  his  enemies  against  him.  Coke,  his  great 
rival  and  life-long  foe,  declared  the  Advancement  of  Learning  a 
work  none  but  a  fool  would  have  written,  and  said  Bacon's  ship 
device  deserved  to  be  freighted  with  fools.  "  0,  that  mine  enemy 
would  write  a  book  !  '^  Nothing  raises  enemies  so  much  as  literary 
talent  of  any  serious  kind  or  super-excellence  above  contemporaries. 


Jt  n®^^  S^^^I/"  ^^  Shakespeare. 

By  W.  F.  C.  WiGSTON. 

"  Certainly  the  most  noteworthy  and  valuable  of  all  the  works  elucidating  the 
inner  meaning  of  the  greatest  poet  of  modern  times  which  have  appeared.  The 
books  on  Shakespeare,  and  his  writings,  would  of  themselves  make  a  respectable 
library,  numerically  considered.  Most  of  them,  however,  are  superficial  and  of 
small  value,  and  many  are  absolutely  worthless.  The  book  under  consideration, 
published  anonymously  in  1884,  seems  not  to  have  received  the  careful  attention 
which  it  undoubtedly  merits.  It  is  evidently  the  production  of  a  scholar  and 
thinker  who  has  given  the  Shakespearean  writings  a  critical  and  exhaustive  exami- 
nation."— The  Platonist. 

^acon,  gbal^espeare,  and  the  Rosicpucians. 

By  the  Same  Author. 

"A  most  remarkable  book.  Like  its  predecessor,  'A  New  Study  of  Shake- 
speare,' one  cannot  open  it  without  learning  something.  .  .  .  But  all  the  same 
the  book  is  a  curiosity,  and  no  Shakespeare-Bacon  libeary  should  be  without 
IT." — Shakexpeariana  {New  York). 

"  A  noteworthy  attempt  has  been  made  to  fix  the  disputed  authorship  of  the 
Shakespearian,  and  likewise  of  other  writings,  upon  a  set  of  literary  eccentrici- 
ties who  existed  in  Shakespeare's  time  under  the  name  of  '  Rosicruciaus,'  after  one 
Christian  Rosenkreuz,  a  German  noble  of  the  fifteenth  century.  The  fame  of  this 
curious  literary  'sect'  has  just  been  revived  by  Mr.  W.  F.  C.  Wigston.  He  en- 
deavors to  show  that  there  existed  in  Shakespeare's  day  a  learned  college  of  men 
who  wrote  in  secret,  among  whom  were  Lord  Bacon,  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  Shake- 
speare and  Ben  Jonson,  and  that  these  together  concocted  the  plays." — West- 
minster Mevieiv. 

"  If  Mr.  Donnelly's  '  great  cryptogram '  should  turn  out  to  be  a  real  discovery, 
we  do  not  see  why  Mr.  Wigston's  should  not  be  so  too.  We  fully  believe  that  the 
two  theories  must  stand  or  fall  together." — Notes  and  Queries, 

Opinion  of  Mr.  James  Hughan,  author  of  many  Masonic  books,  and  reputed 
to  be  the  highest  Masonic  authority  in  England: — "  1  have  carefully  read  your  able 
article  in  the  journal  of  the  Bacon  Society  with  great  interest  and  miich  appreciation. 
Prima  facie,  the  case  is  made  out,  it  appears  to  me,  but  beyond  that  I  cannot  go 
at  present;  but  the  evidence  is  so  remarkable,  as  well  as  curious,  that  no  one  of 
a  thoughtful  mind  could  possibly  refuse  your  claim  to  consideration.  The  New 
Atlantis  seems  to  be,  and  probably  is,  the  key  to  the  modern  Rituals  of  Free- 
masonry. Your  Noble  Volume  on  Bacon,  Shakespeare,  and  the  Rosicruciaus 
does  much  to  clear  the  way." 

"The  most  powerful  argument  yet  issued  on  the  Baconian  side." — Information. 

"  I  have  found  it  an  intensely  interesting  work.  You  are  steadily  pushing 
open  a  door  that  leads  to  a  great  discovery." — Ignatius  Donnelly,  Author  of 
"  The  Great  Cryptogram.''^ 

""We  hail  with  satisfaction  the  publication  of  Mr.  Wigston's  remarkable  and 
learned  work  on  a  subject  of  which  others  have  thought  and  discoursed,  especially 
with  regard  to  the  sonnets,  but  which  is  for  the  first  time  brought  forward  in 
print  with  a  boldness  and  ability  which  must  rank  the  author  as  first  among  the 
pioneers  in  this  newly  opened  mine  of  truth." — The  Bacon  Journal. 

"  It  is  further  admittedly  curious,  and  we  readily  give  Mr.  Wigston  the  benefit 
of  the  fact,  that  among  the  '  misleaders  '  whom  the  Confessio  advises  its  disciples 
to  have  nothing  to  do  with,  '  one  of  the  greatest'  is  stated  to  be  a  '  stage  player,  a 
man  with  sufficient  ingenuity  for  imposition.'" — Light.  . 

"  The  volume  contains  much  that  is  most  interesting." — Glasgow  Herald. 

1 


"This  invaluable  book  (The  Real  History  of  the  Rosi  crucians,  by  A.  S.  TVaite, 
London,  Redwaj,  1887),  should  be  read  in  connection  with  another  important 
volume  which  has  since  been  published,  and  which  follows  the  subject  into 
recesses  whither  it  is  impossible  now  to  attempt  to  penetrate.  Mr.  Wigston  enters 
boldly  and  learnedly  upon  the  connection  perceivable  between  Bacon's  philosophy 
and  Rosicrucianism,  and  the  whole  book  goes  to  prove,  on  very  substantial 
grounds,  that  Bacon  was  probably  the  founder  and  certainly  the  mainstay  of  the 
society." — P.  204,  Fraricis  Bacon  aiid  His  Secret  Society.  Qj  Mrs.  Henry  Pott, 
r.  J.  Schulte  &  Co.,  Chicago,  1891. 

jQermes   gtella;  or, 

notes  and  Jottings  upon  the  jgacon  Gip^GJ** 

By  the  Same  Author. 

"I  read  your  book  with  the  highest  interest  and  pleasure,  from  the  first  page 
to  the  last.  /  think  you  have  'proned  your  case,  and  brought  forward  some  curious  and 
novel  facts.  There  is,  I  think,  no  doubt  that  there  is  a  cipher  in  the  prose  works  of  Lord 
Bacon,  as  you  suygest." — Letter  from  Honorable  Igkatius  Donnelly,  Author  of 
"  Great  Cryptogram;'  etc.,  12th  July,  1890. 

"  Mr.  Wigston  apologizes  for  the  style  of  this  book  on  the  ground  that  it  is 
*  only  a  collection  of  rough  notes  hurried  into  print  by  circumstances  connected 
with  the  theft  of  a  portion  of  the  manuscript.'  No  douot  he  fears  lest  some  future 
Shakespeare,  who  is  the  thief,  may  hereafter  get  the  credit  of  a  work  so  erudite 
and  so  valuable." — Tlie  Bookseller. 

"Rough  and  unmethodical  as  the  book  is,  however,  it  shows  prodigious 
research  and  study,  and  a  really  extraordinary  ingenuity." — PuhlisJiers'  Circular. 

"  Your  book,  Hermes  Stella — admirable  alike  for  perspicuity,  correctness  and  the 
great  labor  bestowed  upon  it — has  been  in  my  nanus  for  some  months.  As  close 
study  as  a  very  busy  life  permitted  me  to  give  to  the  investigation  of  the  cipher 
theory  after  Mr.  Donnelly  published  the  Cryptogram,  led  mo  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  evidence  was  to  be  found,  if  at  all,  in  Lord  Bacon's  acknowledged  works  and 
the  plays  in  combination.  You  are  much  nearer  the  mark,  I  think,  than  Mr.  Don- 
nelly will  ever  attain  from  his  stand." — Letter  from  Warren  Montfort,  Owenton, 
Ky.,  December  1,  1891. 

^^  In  Hermes  Stella,  or  Notes  and  Jottings  upion  the  Bacon  Cipher  (George  Red- 
way),  Mr.  W.  F.  C.  Wigston  greatly  interests  us  by  the  curious  illustrations 
which  he  has  reproduced  in  fac-simile  from  contemporary  editions  of  Bacon's 
works,  showing  what  certainly  seenied  to  bo  secret  marks  occurring  in  the  typog- 
raphy, such  as  the  evidently  intentional  insertion  of  notes  of  interrogation  m 
various  ornamental  head-pieces  and  page-borderings." — John  Bull. 

"Mk.  Wigston's  Baconian  Books.  I  am  indebted  to  Mr.  W.  F.  C.  Wigston 
for  a  copy  of  his  Hermes  Stella,  to  which  I  devoted  a  long  note  in  The  Cntic  of 
October  18,  1890.  I  do  not  know  that  I  can  add  anything  of  importance  to  what 
was  there  said  of  it.  The  supposed  cipher  in  the  1640  edition  of  Bacon's  '  Advance- 
ment of  Learning '  is  very  fully  illustrated  by  fac-similes  of  portions  of  that  book, 
tables  of  numerical  coincidences  with  the  Folio  of  1623  in  significant  words,  etc. 
The  treatment  is  like  Donnelly's  in  *  The  Great  Cryptogram.'" — The  Critic. 

N.  B. — This  work  is  valuable  to  students  of  tbe  Bacon-Shake- 
speare problem  quite  independently  of  any  literary  claim,  on  account 
of  the  Tables  given  ofanumber  of  suspicious  pages  in  the  1 623  Folio 
Plays, —  particularly  those  upon  which  the  words  Francis  Bacon  are 
found.  Also  page  228  of  Lord  Bacon's  "  Resuscitatio  "  (1671),  an 
excessively  rare  work,  is  figured  correctly.  This  last  page  contains 
the  apophthegm  story  relating  to  Hog  and  Bacon,  which  is  undoubt- 
edly in  cipher  connection  with  page  53  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor. 

2 


yraneis  ^acon,  Poet,  prophet,  pbilosopber. 

By  the  Same  Author. 

"  Mr.  Wigston  canwHte  sensibly  etumgh,  and  his  parallel  passages  in  Shakespeare 
and  Bacon  are  interesting. " — Court  Circular. 

"  Mr.  Ignatius  Donnelly  has  an  industrious  rival  or  fellow-laborer  in  Mr.  W.  F. 
C.  Wigston,  who  gives  us  'Francis  Bacon,  Poet,  Prephet,  Philosopher  versus 
Phantom  Captain  Shakespeare,  the  Rosicrucian  Mask.'  (Kegan  Paul.)  Mr.  Wigston 
bases  his  case  largely  on  parallelisms  in  passages  of  Bacon  and  Shakespeare." 
— Graphic. 

' '  A  valuable  addition  to  the  bibliography  of  our  Baconian  literature.  It  brings 
together,  besides  a  number  of  parallels  between  Bacon  and  Shakespeare,  many  eru- 
dite bits  of  knowledge  ;  evidence  from  books  generally  unknown  or  vary  rare ; 
points  which  connect  Bacon  with  the  Rosicrucians  and  with  Rosicrucian  litera- 
ture. It  also  furnishes  fresh  evidence  as  to  the  existence  of  cipher  in  Bacon's 
acknowledged  works. 

"  If  wo  may  venture  to  suggest  an  improvement  to  any  future  edition  of  this 
work,  it  is  that,  in  order  to  make  its  value  duly  felt,  a  good  index  should  be  added. 
The  table  of  contents  gives  an  inadequate  notion  of  the  amount  of  learning  and 
curious  information  contained  within  these  covers. 

"Mr.  W.  F.  C.  Wigston  has  discovered  traces  of  cipher  in  Bacon's  acknowl- 
edged works,  and  I  am  cqiially  sure  of  its  existence  in  many  of  his  nna^knowledged 
works.  Therefore  it  is  of  the  greatest  consequence  that  these  matters  should  not 
only  have  a  fair  hearing,  but  that  they  should  be  met  with  all  the  respect  and 
encouragement  which  befits  pioneer  discoveries  of  great  difficulty  : 
" '  0  Day  and  Night,  but  this  is  wondrous  strange  ! 
And  therefore^  as  a  stranger,  give  it  welcome.^'''' 

— Journal  of  the  Bacon  Society,  January,  1891. 

"  That  Mr.  W.  F.  C.  Wigston,  the  author  of  Feakcis  Bacox  versus  Phantom 
Captain  Shakespeaee  (London:  Kegan  Paul  &  Co.),  has  spared  no  pains  in 
research  and  comparison  of  passages  and  authorities  in  the  compilation  of  his 
work  is  plainly  manifest  upon  every  page.  The  volume  is  interesting  from  its 
theories  as  to  the  identification  of  Rosicrucian  doctrines,  with  many  of  the  philo- 
sophical views  expressed  in  the  plays  in  question.  To  keen  students  of  literary 
problems  and  curiosities  the  volunie  will  be  of  practical  interest,  whether  they 
agree  with  its  theories  or  hold  them  to  be  heterodox  to  the  last  degree." — Court 
Journal. 

^' In  the  present  volume  we  have  much  interesting  matter  concerning  the  Rosi- 
crucians and  their  literature,  together  with  an  elaborate  attempt  to  show  that  '  all  the 
curious  and  recondite  doctrines  held  by  them  are  repeated  by  Bacon,  and  are  also 
to  be  found  in  the  plays.'  Some  of  these,  for  instance,  the  music  of  the  spheres, 
the  notion  that  'the  mind  of  man  is  a  miiTor  or  glass  reflecting  nature,'  that 
natui*e  is  'a  book  or  volume  of  God's  creatures,'  etc. —  had  become  a  part  of 
the  rhetorical  capital  of  both  poets  and  prose  writers  in  Shakespeare's  day ;  and 
the  theories  of  'fascination  and  divination,' the  influence  of  the  seven  planets  in 
mundane  afi"airs,  the  'philosophical  or  ideal  republic;' imitated  from  Plato,  were 
equally  familiar  to  other  than  professed  Rosicrucians.  Mr.  Wigston  would  even 
have  us  note  '  how  remarkable  a  thing  it  is  to  find  the  Rosicnicians  and  their  litera- 
ture appearing  on  the  stage,  and  making  themselves  first  known  on  and  about  the 
date  of  Shakespeare^ s  death,  1616'  (the  italics  are  his  own).  But  to  review  the  book 
with  anything  like  thoroughness  would  take  far  more  space  than  I  can  give  it  hero 
Suffice  it  to  say  that  it  is  well  worth  reading,  aside  from  its  connection  with  the  Bacon, 
and  Shakespeare  controversy.''^ — The  Critic,  Feby.  7, 1891,  Ne%o  York. 

"  The  Mystery  of  Shakespeare.  Mr.  W.  F.  C.  Wigston,  who  has  committed 
himself  heart  and  soul  to  the  theory  of  the  Baconian  authorship  of  Shakespeare's 
plays,  has  supplemented  his  preceding  works  with  a  portly  volume  under  the  defi- 
ant title :  Francis  Bacon,  Poet,  Prophet,  Philosopher,  versus  Phantom  Cap- 
tain Shakespeare,  the  Rosicrucian  Mask.  To  those  who  would  dismiss  inves- 
tigation of  the  subject  with  the  question,  '  What,  after  all,  if  Bacon  did  write  these 
plays  ? '  he  replies,  '  If  the  problem  ended  here  with  simply  a  claim  to  authorship, 

3 


I  confess  I  should  not  care  much  either  whose  name  the  plays  carried.  But  it  is 
certain  this  is,  perhaps,  the  least  part  of  the  problem,  and  only  the  entrance  to  a 
complete  system  of  cipher  revelatory  matter.  .  .  .  The  Rosicrucians  are  at  the 
bottom  of  the  mystery.'  Bacon,  in  his  view,  was  the  founder  of  the  Rosicrucians, 
whose  purpose  was  to  collect  material  for  Lihmm  Naturae,  information  which 
would  suffice  to  command  all  the  avenues  to  the  secrets  of  Nature.  Writing  to 
Father  Fulgentio,  at  Venice,  he  remarked:  *I  work  for  posterity ;  these  things 
requiring  ages  for  their  accomplishment.'  Bacon,  it  is  contended,  concealed  the 
fact  of  his  foundership  of  the  order  on  the  principle  to  which  the  members  were 
committed  by  their  designation  'invisibles.'  Hence  his  choice  of  the  text  which 
he  frequently  quoted,  '  The  Glory  of  God  is  to  conceal  a  thing,  but  the  glory  of  the 
king  is  to  find  it  out,'  and  his  selection  as  motto  to  the  'Novum  Organum  and 
Advancement  of  Learning '  of  a  passage  from  the  book  of  Daniel,  the  immediate 
context  of  which  reads,  '  But  thou,  0  Daniel,  shut  up  the  words  and  seal  the  Book 
even  to  the  time  of  the  end. '  One  of  Bacon's  promises  was  *  Examples '  to  illus- 
trate the  system  set  forth  in  the  '  Instauratio. '  The  second  part  was  to  be  applied 
to  the  fourth,  which  was  to  exemplify  the  method  of  the  mind  in  the  comprehen- 
sion of  things  upon  models.  This  'fourth  part,'  as  well  as  the  fifth  and  sixth,  is 
missing,  although  in  some  of  his  writings,  posthumously  published  at  Amsterdam 
in  1653,  two  of  the  parts  are  referred  to  as  though  they  existed.  The  suggestion  is 
that  these  '  examples '  are  to  be  found  in  the  plays.'' — Tlie  Literary  World. 

"Mr.  Wigston's  quotations  are  frequently  interesting." — Manchester  Guardian. 

"The  literature  of  the  Shakespeare-Bacon  controversy  grows  apace.  Mr.  W. 
F.  C.  Wigston,  whohas  already  written  a  work  on  Bacon,  Shakespspeaee  and  the 
RosiCKUCiANS,  and  another  entitled  Heemes  Stella,  dealing  with  the  Bacon 
cipher,  once  again  returns  to  the  charge  in  Fkancis  Bacon",  Poet,  Pkophet,  Phi- 
LosoPHEE,  veesus  Phantom  Captain  Shakespeaee,  the  Rosiceucian  Mask. 
(London:  Kegan  Paul  <fc  Co.)  The  author  has  already  endeavored  to  show  that 
there  existed  in  Shakespeare's  day  a  group  of  writers  who  used  a  secret  cipher,  and 
that  these  individuals  together  concocted  the  plays." — Liverpool  Post. 

"  The  Baconian  theory  of  Shakespeare,  as  it  is  sometimes  called,  will  die  hard, 
as,  indeed,  was  clearly  shown  by  the  fact  that  it  was  not  killed  by  Mr.  Ignatius 
Donnelly's  cryptogi-ammatical  performances.  Yet  another  thick  quarto  volume 
devoted  to  the  exposure  of  the  person  whom  its  author  calls  '  Phantom  Captain 
Shakespeare,  the  Rosicrucian  mask,'  has  been  published  by  Messrs.  Kegan  Paul 
<fe  Co.,  and  there  is  at  least  this  much  to  be  said  m  its  favor,  that,  however  much 
it  may  fall  short  of  establishing  its  point,  it  is  at  least  possible  to  regard  it  seri- 
ously, and  it  does  not  provoke  laughter  at  every  turn.  The  Rosicrucian  notion  is  just 
the  kind  of  thing  in  which  '  the  curious'  delight,  and  to  them  the  book  may  be 
safely  recommended  as  a  storehouse." — Morning  Post. 

"  Amongst  recent  curiosities  of  literature  a  foremost  place  must  be  accorded  to 
Mr.  Wigston's  learned  work  on  Feancis  Bacon  veesus  Phantom  Captain  Shake- 
speaee. The  notes  lohich  Mr.  Wigston  supplies  on  Rosicrucian  literature  are  often 
interesting  as  well  as  curious." — Leeds  Mercury. 

' '  In  this  volume  are  given  other  curious  fac-similies  of  the  same  character  as 
those  just  mentioned.  They  include  a  reproduction  of  the  Rosicrucian  mark 
adopted  by  Bacon.  There  is  also  a  fine  portrait  of  our  great  English  sage." — John 
Bull. 

These  works  may  be  procured  in  America,  from  Messrs.  F.  J. 
Schulte  &  Co.,  Publishers,  298  Dearborn  Street,  Chicago  j  in  England, 
they  are  to  be  had  at  Messrs.  Kegan  Paul,  Trench,  Triibner  &  Com- 
pany, Paternoster  House,  Charing  Cross  Road,  London. 


NOTABLE  PUBLICATIONS 


OF 


F.  J.  SCHULTE  &  Company. 


THE  WORKS   OF   IGNATIUS   DONNELLY. 

CESAR'S  COLUMN :  A  Stoky  of  the  Twentieth  CEiq-- 
TUKY.     By  Edmund  Boisgilbert,  M.  D.  (Ignatius  Don- 
nelly).    Large  12mo,  cloth,  $1.25.     Paper,  50c. 
The  same  in  Swedish.     Cloth,  $1.25.     Paper  75c.        ^ 
The  same  in  Norwegian.     Cloth,  $1.25.     Paper,  60c. 
In  preparation,  a  German  translation,  at  same  prices. 

"The  most  remarkable  and  thought  producing  novel  that  the  disturbed 
industrial  and  social  conditions  of  the  present  have  produced." — Arena. 

"A  Gabriel's  trump." — Frances  E.  Willard. 

"A  very  extraordinary  production." — Et.  Rev.  Henry  C.  Potter. 

"The  effect  of  an  honest  purpose  is  felt  in  every  line." — Pioneer' Press. 

"It  is  exceedingly  interesting  as  a  narrative,  and  is  written  by  a  man  of 
thcmght,  learning  and  imagination.  I  consider  it  the  best  work  of  its  class  BvacQ 
Bulwer's  *  Coming  Eace.'  I  was  impressed  with  the  power  of  the  book  —  the 
vividness  and  strength  with  which  the  incidents  of  the  tale  are  described 
and  developed.  The  plot  is  absorbing,  and  yet  nothing  in  it  seems  forced. 
The  conception  of  the  '  Column '  is  as  original  as  its  treatment  is  vigorous. 
There  is  no  padding  in  the  book ;  the  events  are  portrayed  terselv  and  clearly. 
The  analysis  is  reasonable  and  sagacious,  and  the  breadth  of  the  author's 


2         Notalle  PuUications  of  F.  J.  SchuUe  &  Co. 

mind,  as  well  as  his  careful  study  of  social  conditions,  is  made  evident  hj  his 
treatment  of  the  discussions  put  into  the  mouths  of  his  characters.  Justice  is 
done  to  each  side." — Julian  Hawthorne. 

"As  an  example  of  the  highest  literary  form  it  deserves  unstinted  praise.'" 
—  Cardinal  Gibbons 

DOCTOR  HUGUET  :   A  Novel.     By  Ignatius  Donnelly. 
Large  12mo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $1.25.     Paper,  50c. 

**  This  latest  work  of  Mr.  Donnelly  is  fully  equal,  if  not  superior,  in  origi- 
nality and  strength  to  all  that  have  preceded  it.  The  plot  is  based  on  one  of 
the  burning  questions  of  the  day — the  race  problem  — and  it  is  one  of  the  most 
original  and  striking  conceptions  in  literature.  .  .  .  We  are  safe  in  saying 
that  no  book  of  recent  date  has  created  the  sensation  which  '  Doctor  Huguet' 
will  create  Mr.  Donnelly's  acknowledged  power  as  a  writer  is  seen  to  a 
marked  degree  in  this  new  work,  and  many  remarkably  fine  passages  attest 
his  skill  and  scholarship." — St.  Joseph  (Mo.)  Neus. 

RAGNAROK:    The  Age   of  Fire  an^d   Gravel.     By 
Ignatius  Donnelly.      Illustrated.      Large   12mo,  cloth, 
$2.00. 
Mr.  Donnelly  himself  considers  this  his  greatest  work. 

"The  title  of  this  book  is  taken  from  the  Scandinavian  sagas,  or  legends, 
and  means  '  the  darkness  of  the  gods. '  The  work  consists  of  a  chain  of  argu- 
ments and  facts  to  prove  a  series  of  extraordinary  theories,  viz.;  That  the 
Drift  Age,  with  its  vast  deposits  of  clay  and  gravel,  its  decomposed  rocks  and 
its  great  rents  in  the  face  of  the  globe,  was  the  result  of  contact  between  the 
earth  and  a  comet,  and  that  the  Drift-material  was  brought  to  the  earth  by  the 
comet;  that  man  lived  on  the  earth  at  that  time;  that  he  was  highly  civilized; 
that  all  the  human  family,  with  the  exception  of  a  few  persons  who  saved 
themselves  in  caves,  perished  from  the  same  causes  which  destroyed  the 
mammoth  and  the  other  pre- glacial  animals ;  that  the  legends  of  all  the  races  of 
the  world  preserve  references  to  .and  descriptions  of  this  catastrophe;  that 
following  it  came  a  temble  age  of  ice  and  snow,  of  great  floods  while  the 
clouds  were  restoring  the  waters  to  the  sea,  and  an  age  of  darkness  while  the 
dense  clouds  enfolded  the  globe.  These  startling  ideas  are  supported  by  an 
array  of  scientific  facts,  and  by  legends  drawn  from  all  ages  and  all  regions  of 
the  earth." 

"  The  work  will  be  read  with  curious  interest  by' the  learned,  and,  though 
it  draws  perpetually  on  the  treasuries  of  scientific  and  ethnic  lore,  the  un- 
learned will  pore  over  its  pages  with  eagerness  and  delight.  .  .  .  '  Ragna- 
rok '  is  a  strong  and  brilliant  literary  production,  A^hich  will  command  the  in 
terest  of  general  readers,  and  the  admiration  and  respect,  if  not  the  universal 
credence,  of  the  conservative  and  the  scientific." — Prof.  Alexander  Win- 
CHELL,  in  tlie  Dial. 

ATLANTIS  :   The  Ai^tediluviai^-  World.     By  Ignatius 
Donnelly.     Illustrated.     Large  12mo,  cloth^  $2.00. 

"These  propositions  are  startling,  and  would  be  incredible  if  they  were 
not  supported  by  adequate  testimony,  which,  however,  Mr.  Donnelly  has  col- 
lated from  a  great  variety  of  sources.  He  brings  to  bear  upon  the  question  an 
amount  of  classical,  historical,  geological,  ethnological  and  miscellaneous 
knowledge  which  is  altogether  surprising,  marshaling  his  arguments  in  the 
clearest  and  most  efi"ective  manner,  and  presenting  them  in  perfect  English, 
frequently  rising  into  eloquence.  .  .  .  It  is  a  marvel  of  erudition  and  in- 
genuity, and  a  work  of  immense  research." — Tlie  Guardian,  Banbury,  Eng- 
land. 


Notable  Publications  of  F.  J.  Schulte  S  Co.         3 

THE    GREAT  CRYPTOGRAM:      Francis    Bacon^s 

Cipher    ii^  the    so-called    Shakespeare   Plays. 

By   Ignatius  Donnelly.     Large   8vo,   998  pages,  cloth, 
extra,  $2.50. 

DONNELLIANA:  Excerpts  from  the  Wit,  Wisdom, 
Eloquence  and  Positry  of  Ignatius  Donnelly. 
With  a  Biography.  By  Everett  W.  Fish,  M.  D.  Large 
12mo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $1.50. 

LE   ROY   ARMSTRONG. 

AN  INDIANA  MAN.  By  Le  Roy  Armstrong.  12mo, 
cloth,  extra,  $1.00.     Paper,  50c. 

"  a  powerful  novel,  ehamiiiigly  written.  So  true  to  the  real  life  of  mod- 
em polities  as  to  seem  more  like  history  and  biography  than  romance." — Inter 
Ocean. 

"  Of  intimate  personal  knowledge  of  the  phases  of  life  described,  of  fault- 
less discrimination  in  the  choice  of  essential  facts,  and  of  the  power  to  write 
them  well,  Mr.  Armstrong  has  proved  himself  a  master." — Evening  Post. 

"Its  purpose  is  to  purify  personal  living  and  correct  politics.  No  man 
could  have  a  nobler  or  a  more  needed  motive." — Frances  E.  Willaed. 

"  Out  of  the  everyday  happenings  of  a  country  town  the  author  has  con- 
structed a  stor}'  that  holds  the  reader's  attention  from  beginning  to  end."— 
Chicago  Herald. 

"  The  story  centers  in  the  saloon  of  an  Indiana  town.  .  .  .  There  is  not 
a  line  of  moralizing  in  it,  but  it  is  a  faithful,  realistic,  dramatic,  moving  recital 
of  events.  The  scenes  of  rural  life  are  depicted  with  a  graphic  skill  that  would 
not  have  done  discredit  to  the  immortal  author  of  'Adam  Bede.'" — Voice. 

ROBERT    H.   COWDREY. 

A  TRAMP  IN  SOCIETY.  By  Robert  H.  Cowdrey. 
12mo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  11.25.     Paper,  50c. 

"Thrilling and  fascinating.  .  .  .  No  one  who'reads  it  can  restrain  ad- 
miration for  the  man  who  can  write  a  story  that  contains  in  its  warp  and  woof 
so  much  that  is  helpful  and  bettering  to  humanity." — Arkansaw  Traveler. 

"  "Wo  have  had  a  dozen  or  more  novels  of  late  that  have  had  new  eco- 
nomic schemes  for  a  basis,  but  mostly  advocating  state  socialism.  At  last  we 
have  the  individualistic  novel,  and  it  ought  to  win  widespread  favor.  Mr. 
Cowdrey  has  strong  conviction,  a  good  command  of  English  and  strong  im- 
agination."— St.  Louis  Republic. 

C.  C.  POST. 

DRIVEN  FROM  SEA  TO  SEA ;  or,  Just  a-Campin'. 
By  0.  C.  Post.  Large  12mo,  illustrated,  cloth,  $1.25. 
Paper,  50c. 

"  Since  the  days  that  Mrs.  Stowe  wrote  the  doom  of  the  slave-driver  in 
'  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin '  no  author  has  struck  a  more  vigorous  blow  in  favor  of  the 
rights  of  the  laborer." — Chicago  Inter  Ocean. 


4  Notable  Publications  of  F.  J,  Schulte  S  Co. 

OPIE   READ'S    FAMOUS    NOVELS. 

A  KENTUCKY  COLONEL.  By  Opie  Read.  Large 
12mo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $1.25    Paper,  50c. 

"In  these  days  of  endless  foreign  importations  in  the  line  of  literature, 
when  readers  are  constantly  hobnobbing  with  lords,  dukes  and  princes  in  Eng- 
lish novels,  and  characters  with  unpronounceable  names  or  undefinable  morals, 
in  Russian,  French  or  Italian  fiction,  it  is  an  unmistakable  relief  to  pick  up  a 
book  like 'A  Kentucky  Colonel.  " — Book  Talk. 

Hon.  Hexky  C.  Caldwell,  who  is  not  only  one  of  the  greatest  of 
American  lawyers,  but  one  of  the  best  of  literary  critics,  says:  "I 
have  never  read  a  better  story.  It  is  the  most  beautifully  written,  the 
most  strikuK/  in  character,  and  upon  the  whole  one  of  the  most  thrilling  and  yet 
chaste  piece's  of  fiction  that  has  been  produced  in  many  a  day.  It  will  create  a 
sensation. " 

"  A  book  the  popularity  of  which  will  not  be  temporary.  It  has  virility, 
tenderness,  striking  character  pictures  and  the  American  flavor." — Chicago 
Journal. 

"  There  is  a  rich  vein  of  true  humor  and  of  healthy  and  vigorous  senti- 
ment, and  it  has  a  fresh  and  breezy  atmosphere  which  is  heartily  welcome  in 
view  of  the  hot-house  character  of  much  of  our  fiction." — Philadelphia 
Record. 

EMMETT  BONLORE.  By  Opie  Read.  Large  12mo, 
cloth,  gilt  top,  $1.25.     Paper,  50c. 

A  book  combining  all  ihe  qualities  which  have  made  "  A  Kentucky 
Colonel "  so  popular,  with  even  greater  variety  of  action  and  incident  and 
character,  and  full  of  rich  and  sparkling  humor. 

"  A  novel  of  remarkable  power  and  interest  " —  Spirit. 

"  A  notable  contribution  to  recent  literature."  —  Booh  Buyer. 

LEN  GANSETT.  By  Opie  Read.  12mo,  cloth,  $1.25. 
Paper  50c. 

* '  So  beautiful,  so  chaste, .  so  full  of  simple,  rugged  honesty  and  pure, 
wholesome  sentiment,  that  no  one  can  read  the  book  without  being  bettered. 
.  .  ,  It  is  full  of  gentle  humor  that  has  just  enough  tart  in  it  to  make  it 
appetizing.  Some  of  the  word-painting  is  almost  sublime,  and  everywhere 
there  is  that  broad,  sweet  touch  of  tenderness  that  is  a  part  of  the  author's 
very  self." — Am.  Commercial  Traveler. 

SELECTED  STORIES.  By  Opie  Read.  16mo,  cloth,  gilt 
top,  $1.00.  Paper,  50c.  Sixteen  gems  set  in  one  beau- 
tiful volume. 

•'  These  stories  of  Opie  Read  are  admirable.  The  mingled  strain  of  broad 
humor,  irrepressible  anecdote  and  touching  pathos  recall  to  me  vividly  the 
inimitable  Lincoln  as  a  raconteur." — Mks.  Madeleine  Vinton  Dahlgeen. 

"  I  thank  you  for  the  dainty  volume.  'Sun  Dust'  and  *  An  Arkansas  Hang- 
ing'delighted  me  especially.  They  should  be  in  the  repertoire  of  every  elo- 
cutionist. *  John  and  J  ack '  and  *  There  was  a  Fool '  are  veiy  amusing,  and 
''Little  Diser '  very  touching.  ...  I  am  glad  to  see  that  Mr.  Read  is  be- 
ginning to  pick  up  his  diamonds  and  polish  them."  — Octave  Thanet. 


Notable  PuUications  of  F.  J.  ScliuUe  &  Co.        5 

"These  stories  have  a  wonderful  completeness  about  them,  and  in  their 
pathos,  humor  and  imagination  are  certain  to  attract  readers  who  long  for 
something  new  in  fiction." — Philadelphia  Hecord. 

"They  have  a  life  meaning,  all  of  them." — Picayune. 

LEWIS    VITAL   BOGY. 

IN  OFFICE :  A  Story  of  Washikgtok  Life  an^d  Soci- 
ety.    By  Lewis  Vital  Bogy.     12mo,  paper,  25c. 

"  The  writer  of  this  novel  is  to  be  commended  for  the  eflbrt  he  makes  to 
show  the  pitfalls  and  the  dangers  of  Washington  official  life  to  a  young  girl 
who  lacks  a  male  protector.  .  .  .  It  is  not  difficult  to  draw  the  conclusion 
that  the  narrative  is  simply  a  disguise  for  actual  happenings  at  the  Nation's 
capital.  Mr.  Bogy,  whoever  he  may  be,  has  written  a  l)rief  and  extremely 
clever  story  that  should  commend  itself  to  the  general  reading  public," — Neio 
Orleans  States. 

' '  The  characters  are  so  accurately  drawn  that  several  Washington  people 
have  no  troiible  in  recognizing  themselves  in  print.  The  book  is  causmg 
quite  a  sensation." — Washington  Dupatch  to  St.  Louis  Globe-Democrat. 

ALVAH    M.  KERR. 

AN  HONEST  LAWYER.  By  Alvah  Milton  Kerr.  12mo, 
cloth,  extra,  gilt  top,  $1.25.     Paper,  50c. 

A  volume  which  is  certain  to  attract  general  attention,  not  only  in  the 
United  States,  but  far  beyond  the  limits  of  our  country.  '  'An  Honest  Lawyer ' 
is  a  novel  with  a  purpose.  The  author  believes  that,  as  it  is  impossible  to 
conceive  of  a  millionaire  Christ,  so  the  accumulation  of  wealth  beyond  reason- 
able limits  is  inconsistent  with  true  Christianity.  The  plot  of  the  story  is 
laid  in  a  growing  Western  town,  and  the  characters  are  living,  breathing 
Americans.  In  fact,  this  is  distinctively  an  American  novel,  and, as  such,  and 
because  of  the  fascinating  interest  of  the  story  and  the  mastetful  style  in 
which  it  is  written,  it  will  commend  itself,  aside  from  the  lessons  conveyed, 
to  all  who  admire  the  virile  and  original  in  literature. 

THOMAS    AND    ANNA    M.  FITCH. 

BETTER  DAYS;  or,  A  Millionaire  of  To-morrow. 
By  Thomas  and  Anna  M.  Fitch.  12mo,  cloth,  extra, 
gilt  top,  11.25.     Paper,  50c. 

A  wonderful  book,  filled  with  wit,  eloquence  and  philosophy,  and  a  nar- 
rative of  such  thrilling  interest  as  to  carry  the  reader  without  stop  from  cover 
to  cover. 

"  It  is  one  of  those  volumes  which  the  reader  feels  called  upon  to  finish 
at  a  single  sitting." — St.  Louis  Mepublic. 

"  The  authors  of  this  fascinating  book  are  Tom  Fitch,  our  silver-tongued 
orator,  and  his  gifted  wife,  and  their  combined  talent  has  produced  a  work 
which  is  far  superior  to  anything  that  has  appeared  for  years  in  our  literary 
world.  The  authors  treat,  in  a  lucid  manner,  some  of  the  most  important 
questions  of  the  day.  The  arguments  of  both  sides  are  given  in  a  fair  and  im- 
partial manner,  and  a  plausible  solution  ofiered.  The  treatment  of  the  labor 
question  shows  great  power  of  observation,  and  the  volume  on  the  whole  indi- 


G  Natalie  Puhlications  of  F.  J.  ScUulte  &  Co. 

cates  sound  common  sense,  a  great  gift  of  demonstration,  eloquence  of  lan- 
guage and  high  moi-al  views.  The  romance  forming  the  skeleton  of  the  book 
hokts  the  attention  of  the  reader  throughout." — San  Francisco  News  Letter. 

FRANC   B.  WILKIE   ("Poliuto"). 

PERSONAL  REMINISCENCES  OF  THIRTY-FIVE 
YEARS  OF  JOURNALISM.  By  Franc  B.  Wilkie 
('^'^Poliuto").  Large  12mo,  cloth  extra,  gilt  top,  ele- 
gant cover  design  in  gold  and  silver,  $1.50.  Half  mo- 
rocco, $3.00. 

''  A  valuable  addition  to  the  history  of  journalism.  It  is  written  in  Mr. 
Wilkie's  best  and  most  trenchant  style,  and  typographically  it  is  a  model  of 
beauty.  .  .  .  This  book  is  as  fascinating  as  a  novel.  It  is  the  story  of  a 
typical  American  youth,  sprung  from  the  soil,  who,  through  poverty,  distress, 
defeat  and  hardship,  at  last  fought  his  way  to  eminence  and  command.  It  is 
such  a  story  as  perhaps,  with  change  of  circumstances,  might  describe  the  lives 
often  thousand  living  Americans.  It  is  the  story  of  a  boy  born  close  to  the 
bleakest  of  New  England  hills,  whose  earliest  childhood  saw  life  surrounded 
with  but  little  sunlight,  and  whose  horizon  was  bounded,  if  not  by  poverty, 
yet  Avitli  such  amelioration  as  hard  manual  labor  could  compel.  But  it  is  these 
res  angusta  domi  men  —  the  farmers'  boys,  who  have  wrested  success  in  life 
from  the  most  untoward  circumstances  —that  have  made  this  country  what  it 
is.     Air.  Wilkie  was  one  of  these." — Chicago  Herald. 

"  To  newspaper  men  this  book  will  prove  as  great  a  joy  as  Anthony  Trol- 
lope's  '  Autobiography'  was  to  the  thousands  who  found  it  the  most  readable 
book  that  prolific  writer  produced." — Booh  and  Neicsdealer. 

WM.  E.  BURKE. 

FEDERAL  FINANCES  ;  or.  The  Ii^come  of  the  Ukited 
States.    By  Wm.  E.  Burke.    Illustrated.     12mo,  clo 

11.25. 

"Supplies  a  need  of  the  times,  inasmuch  as  it  furnishes  an  intelligible  ex- 
planation of  our  American  system  of  taxation,  written  in  such  a  simple  and 
direct  style  that  the  ordinary  intellect  can  readily  grasp  its  meaning.  .  .  . 
Abstruse  tables  of  figures  and  all  other  and  kindred  wearisome  forms  are  dis- 
carded, and  his  exposition  of  the  nation's  finances  and  methods  of  obtaining 
the  income  required  to  perpetuate  the  goverment  reads  like  a  well-told  story. 
He  makes  no  attempt  to  discourse  upon  the  dry  subject  of  political  economy, 
but  deals  entirely  with  the  facts  involved.  Beginning  with  the  first  Biblical 
account  of  taxation,  he  traces  his  subject  in  the  most  interesting  way  from  a 
period  anterior  to  the  advent  of  coin  money,  through  the  era  of  tithes  and 
tenths,  the  methods  of  oriental  countries,  Greek  and  Roman  systems,  down  to 
the  first  recorded  attempt  of  England  to  secure  governmental  revenue,  and 
the  subsequent  artifices  of  British  kings  and  governing  bodies  to  establish 
taxes.     Then  follows  the  history  of  taxation  in  the  new  world  down  to  the 

S resent,  a  chapter  on  the  sources  of  federal  income,  a  description  of  collection 
istricts  and  customs  ofiicers,  of  the  revenue  marine  and  all  its  ramifications, 
discriminating  duties  and  reciprocity,  avoidance  of  duties  by  dishonest  people 
and  their  practices,  a  chapter  on  smuggling,  another  on  the  peculiarities  of  the 
Mexican  n-onticr  and  Pacific  coast  and  others,  on  internal  revenue  in  its  sev- 
eral departments,  revenue  frauds,  seigniorage,  miscellaneous  revenues,  public 
lands,  etc." — Burliiigton  Hawkeye. 


Notable  PuUications  of  F.  J.  SchuUe  <&  Co.        7 

MRS.  HENRY    POTT. 

FRANCIS  BACON  AND  HIS  SECRET  SOCIETY  :  Aif 
Attempt  to  Collect  aistd  U:NriTE  the  Lost  Lin^ks  of 
A  LoKG  AN^D  Strong  Chain^.  By  Mrs.  Henry  Pott, 
editor  of  '^  Bacon's  Promus.^'  Illustrated  with  twenty- 
seven  full-page  plates.  Post  8vo,  421  pages,  cloth 
extra,  gilt  top,  $2.00. 

S.  F.   NORTON. 

TEN  MEN  OF  MONEY  ISLAND ;  or.  The  Primer  of 

Fika:n"CE.     By  S.  F.  Norton.     16mo,    cloth,  gilt    top, 
11.00.  Paper,  25c. 

"It  makes  the  money  guestion,  which  has  bothered  so  many  brains,  as 
simple  as  the  alphabet.  It  is  a  literary  wonder  in  this,  that  it  mates  posting 
one's  self  on  the  fundamental  principles  of  righteous  finance  as  easy  and  pleas- 
ant reading  as  'Robinson  Crusoe.'"—  Lester  G.  Hubbard. 

MRS.  MARION    TODD. 

PIZARRO  AND  JOHN  SHERMAN.  By  Mrs.  Marion 
Todd.     12mo,  paper,  25c. 

"  This  book  treats  exclusively  on  the  money  question.  It  handles  the 
subject  both  historically  and  argiimentatively,  and:  Avhen  the  reader  lays  it 
down  he  will  have  a  comprehensive  knowledge  of  this  momentous  topic." — 
Faryners'  Voice. 

PROTECTIVE  TARIFF  DELUSION.  ^  By  Mi;s.  Marion 
Todd.     12mo,  cloth,  75c.     Paper,  25c. 

"  The  best  book  ever  written  upon  the  subject  for  the  general  reader." — 
Col.  B.  S.  Heath. 

"  This  book  should  be  in  the  hands  of  every  public  speaker." — Hastings 
Journal. 

THE  RIGHTS  OF  WOMAN ;  or.  Prof.  Goldwik  Sx¥Ith 
AKD  HIS  Satellites  ik  Congress.  By  Mrs.  Marion 
Todd.     12mo,  cloth,  75c.     Paper,  30c. 

"The  brightest  defense  of  woman's  natural  rights  that  we  have  ever 
read. " —  Nonconformist. 

"A  clear  and  cogent  presentation  of  the  facts  relating  to  the  suifrage 
question.  "We  are  free  to  say  that,  although  Mrs.  Todd  cannot  vote,  she  can 
argue  with  ability  and  skill"— CAica^o  Herald. 

MICHAEL  J.  SCHAACK. 

ANARCHY  AND  ANARCHISTS.  By  Michael  J. 
Schaack,  Captain  of  Police.  With  over  200  original 
illustrations.  698  pp.,  8vo,  cloth,  $2.00.  Half  mo 
rocco,  $3.00. 


8         Notable  Pnhlications  of  F.  J.  Schulte  S  Co. 

RICHARD    L.   GARY,  JR.  ("Hyder  Ali  "). 

TALE8  OF  THE  TUEF  and  ^^Kank  Outsiders."    By 
Eichard  L.  Gary,  Jr.  (^^Hyder  Ali");  with  illustrations 
by  Gean  Smith.     Quarto,  cloth,  $2.50;  half  calf,  $3.50; 
full  morocco,  $5.00. 
"The  author  has  succeeded  in  clothing  turf  history,  fancy  and  romance 

in  the  garb  of  poetry,  in  verses  that  are  not  only  smooth  and  flowing,  but  clean 

in  tone.      The  publishers  have  been  lavish  but  tasteful  in  the  typographical 

production."  —  Horseman. 

K.  L.  ARMSTRONG. 

THE  LITTLE  GIANT  CYCLOPEDIA :  A  Treasury 
OF  Eeady  Eeferekce.  By  K.  L.  Armstrong.  A 
million  and  one  facts  and  figures.  Eighty-two  colored 
plates  and  maps.  16mo,  full  leather  binding,  flexible, 
red  edges,  $1.00. 

This  remarkable  book  has  had  a  sale  reaching  into  the  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands, and  is  steadily  growing  in  popularity.  It  is  constantly  revised,  and 
brought  up  to  date  with  each  new  edition. 

"  This  wonderful  book  will  add  a  year  to  any  man's  lifetime  if  it  is  true 
that  time  saved  is  time  snatched  from  the  grave." — Ottawa  TriJ)une. 

ELI    F.  BROWN,  M.  D. 

SEX  AND  LIEE :  The  Physiology  and  Hygiene  of 
THE  Sexual  Oeganization.  By  Eli  F.  Brown,  M.  S., 
M.  D.,  author  of  *^  The  House  I  Live  In,^'  etc.,  etc. 
Illustrated.       16mo,  cloth,  extra,  $1.00.     Paper,  50c. 

A  clean,  popular,  scientific  book,  by  an  author  of  high  repute,  on  a  subject 
of  the  utmost  importance,  but  which  has  never  before  been  treated  in  a  manner 
suitable  for  general  circulation. 

C.  ROPP. 

EOPFS  COMMERCIAL  CALCULATOR:  A  Practical 
Arithmetic  for  Practical  Purposes.  Containing  a 
complete  system  of  accurate  and  convenient  tables,  to- 
gether with  simple,  short  and  practical  methods  for 
rapid  calculation.  By  C.  Ropp.  Leatherette,  25c. 
Artificial  leather,  with  pocket  silicate  slate  and  account 
book,  50c.     Am.  Russia,  11.00.     Genuine  Russia,  $1.50. 


F.  J.  SCHULTE  &  COMPANY,  Publishers, 

298  Dearbork  Street, 

CHICAGO. 


CESAR'S  COLUMN 

A  Story  of  the  Twentieth  Century. 


By  EDMUND  BOISGILBERT,  M.  D. 

[IGNATIUS  DONNELLY] 


This  wonderful  book  was  first  issued  in  June,  1890.  The 
name  on  the  title  page  was  Edmund  Boisgilbert,  M.  D.,  and 
it  was  given  out  that  this  was  a  pseudonym.  The  leading 
magazines  and  reviews,  with  one  exception,  and  many  of  the 
great  newspapers  entirely  ignored  the  book,  and  everything  at 
first  was  agfainst  its  success.    It  created  the  most  profound  in- 


C/tSAR'S  COLUMN— WHAT  THE  CRITICS  SAY. 

terest,  however,  among  those  who  read  it,  and  soon  became 
talked  about.  Julian  Hawthorne,  Bishop  Potter,  Fran- 
ces E.  WiLLARD  and  others  spoke  highly  of  it,  and  Cardinal 
Gibbons  praised  it  as  an  example  of  the  highest  literary  form. 
Opie  p.  Read  summed  up  its  charm  in  these  words:  "//  will 
thrill  a  careless  reader  of  novels ^or  profoundly  impress  a 
statesman.  It  is  gentle  as  a  child  and  yet  it  is  rugged  as  a 
giant."  In  six  months  "Caesar's  Column"  passed  through 
twelve  editions,  and  considerable  guessing  was  done  as  to  the 
real  name  of  the  author,  among  those  prominently  named  be- 
ing Judge  Tourgee,  Mark  Twain,  T.  V.  Powderly,  Robert  G. 
Ingersoll,  Chauncey  M.  Depew,  Benj.  F.  Butler  and  others.  In 
December  it  was  finally  announced  that  Ignatius  Donnelly, 
author  of  "Atlantis,"  "  Ragnarok  "  and  "  The  Great  Crypto- 
gram," was  also  the  author  of  "  Cassar's  Coiumn."  Mr.  Don- 
nelly had  escaped  general  suspicion  because  his  previous  writ- 
ings are  more  distinguished  by  laborious  industry  and  wide 
information  than  by  the  qualities  that  go  to  make  the  creator 
of  romances. 

"  In  '  Caesar's  Column '  Mr.  Donnelly  takes  as  his  text  the 
dangerous  tendencies  of  our  age  and  gives  a  picture  of 
what  the  world  will  be  a  hundred  years  from  now,  if  the 
spirit  of  invention  and  material  progress  remains  the  same 
and  the  moral  spirit  of  society  moves  along  in  its  present 
channels.  The  San  Francisco  Chronicle  aptly  says:  In  a 
startlingly  original  and  fascinating  novel  he  presents  a  pro- 
found study  of  sociological  conditions. 


WHAT  THE  CRITICS  SAY. 

"A  Gabriel's  trump."— Frances  E.  Willard. 

"A  very  extraordinary  production."— Rt.  Rev.  Henry  C.  Potter. 

"  The  effect  of  an  honest  purpose  is  felt  in  every  line." — Pioneer  Press. 


C/£SAR'S  COLUMN— WHAT  THE  CRITICS  SAY. 

As  an  example  of  the  highest  literary  form  it  deserves  unstinted 
praise." — Cardinal  Gibbons. 

"  A  wonderfully  fascinating  book.  It  will  hold  the  attention  of  the 
world  as  no  other  book  has  held  it  for  years." — Chicago  Saturday  Blade, 

" '  Caesar's  Column,'  in  its  vivid  portrayal^  will  lead  many  to  realize 
the  many  dangers  to  which  our  country  is  liable." — Hon.  Wm.  Larrabee. 

"  I  was  unable  to  lay  it  down  until  I  had  finished  reading  it.  It 
should  be  read  by  every  farmer  in  the  land." — H.  L.  LouCKS,  President 
National  Farmers*  Alliance. 

"  Bellamy  looks  backward  upon  what  is  impossible  as  well  as  im- 
probable. *  Caesar's  Column '  looks  forward  to  what  is  not  only  pos- 
sible, but  probable:' — MiLTON  GEORGE. 

"  1  have  read  *  Caesar's  Column '  Wice  and  am  convinced  that  it  has 
\>ttvi  written  in  the  nick  of  time.  *  *  *  I  predict  for  the  book  an 
immense  sale  and  a  world-wide  discussion." — Corinne  S.  Brown,  Sec- 
retary Nationalist  Club,  Chicago. 

"  The  story  is  most  interestingly  devisea  and  strongly  told.  It  is  not 
the  work  of  a  pessimist  or  an  anarchist,  but  rather  of  a  preacher  who 
sees  the  dangers  that  all  thoughtful  men  see  in  our  time,  and,  appreci- 
ating the  importance  to  humanity  of  maintaining  what  is  good  in  ex- 
isting systems,  utters  his  warning  as  a  sacred  duty." — Free  Press. 

"  The  book  points  out  tendencies  which  actually  exist  and  are  in 
need  of  cure.  It  warns  us  with  vehemence  and  force  of  the  necessity 
of  guarding  our  liberties  against  the  encroachments  of  monopoly  and 
plutocracy,  and  of  disarming  corruption  in  government  by  every  device 
that  a  vigilant  ingenuity  can  supply." — George  Gary  Eggleston.  in 
New  York  World. 

'  The  most  remarkable  and  thought-provoking  novel  ih2ii  the  disturbed 
industrial  and  social  conditions  of  the  present  have  produced.  *  *  * 
The  purpose  of  this  book  is  to  arrest  attention— to  make  men  think 
wisely  and  act  justly,  and  with  dispatch.  The  write  •  holds  it  as  a  sig- 
nal of  danger  before  the  on-coming  train.  Will  the  warning  be 
\eeded  ?  "—The  Arena. 

"  The  author  writes  with  tremendous  feeling  and  great  imaginative 
po?ver.  The  picture  gives  in  startling  colors  what  would  be  the  case 
if  many  of  our  business  methods  and  social  tendencies  were  to  move 


CiESAR'S  COLUMN— WHAT  THE  CRITICS  SAY. 

on  unimpeded  to  their  legitimate  results.  The  book  is  a  plea,  and  a 
striking  one.  Its  plot  is  bold,  its  language  is  forceftil,  and  the  great  up- 
rising is  given  with  terrible  vividness." — Public  Opinion. 

'^  Intense y  stirring  and  eloquent.  No  SUCh  book  has  ever  before 
appeared  in  the  annals  of  literature.  Its  story  is  here  and  there  bright- 
ened by  the  sweetness  of  a  pure  love,  but  the  general  tone  is  one  which 
should  make  every  honest  heart  shiver  for  the  future.  The  truth  peers 
out  from  every  page.  No  man  will  read  this  book  without  a  new  sense 
of  duty  and  responsibility  to  his  country." — The  Great  West. 

"  One  of  the  wonderful  features  of  this  wonderful  book  is  that  it 
anticipated  Dr.  Koch's  great  discovery.  It  represents  a  philosopher 
living  a  hundred  years  from  now  as  finding  out  that  all  bacteria  are 
accompanied  by  minute  hostile  forms  of  life  that  prey  upon  them; 
that  these  preserve  the  balance  of  nature,  and  by  destroying  the  other 
bacilli  which  infest  the  animal  world,  prevent  the  utter  destruction  of 
mm:'— Book  Talk. 

"  It  is  exceedingly  interesting  as  a  narrative  and  is  written  by  a  man 
of  tho^ighty  learning  and  imagination.  I  consider  it  the  best  work  of 
its  cla^s,  since  Bulwer's  *  Coming  Race.'  I  was  impressed  with  the 
power  of  the  book — the  vividness  and  strength  with  which  the  inci- 
dents of  the  tale  are  described  and  developed.  The  plot  is  absorbing, 
and  yet  nothing  in  it  seems  forced.  The  conception  of  the  *  Column' 
is  as  original  as  its  treatment  is  vigorous.  There  is  no  padding  in  the 
book;  the  events  are  portrayed  tersely  and  clearly.  The  analysis  is 
reasonable  and  sagacious,  and  the  breadth  of  the  author's  mind,  as 
well  as  his  careful  study  of  social  conditions,  is  made  evident  by  his 
treatment  of  the  discussions  put  into  the  mouths  of  his  characters. 
Justice  is  done  to  each  side."— Julian  Hawthorne. 


One  Volume,  Large  12mo,  367  Pages. 


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A  KENTUCKY  COLONEL 

By  OPIE  p.  read. 


A  SYMPOSIUM  OF  OPINION. 

THIS  is  pre-eminently  an  American  book  by  an  American 
author.  ^^^/^  T'*:?/^  says  of  it:  "In  these  days  of 
endless  foreign  importations  in  the  line  of  literature,  when 
readers    are    constantly    hobnobbing    with    lords,    dukes, 

and  princes  in  English 
novels,  and  characters 
with  unpronounceable 
names  or  undefinable 
morals,  in  Russian, 
French  or  Italian  fiction, 
it  is  an  unmistakable 
relief  to  pick  up  a  book 
like  '  A  Kentucky  Col- 
onel."' 

Hon.  Henry  C. 
Caldwell,  who  is  not 
only  one  of  the  greatest 
of  American  lawyers, 
but  one  of  the  best  of 
literary  critics,  says:  "I 
have  never  read  a  better 
story.  It  is  ifke  77iost  beautifully  written^  the  most  striking  in 
character y  and  upon  the  whole  one  of  the  most  thrilling  and 
yet  chaste  pieces  of  fiction  that  has  been  produced  in  many  a 
day.  It  will  create  a  sensation." 
"  A  novel  of  remarkable  power  and  interest." — Spirit. 
"  A  notable  contribution  to  recent  literature."— ^^^/^  Buver 


(3^053^. 


«  A  KENTUCKY  COLONEL  "—SOME  OPINIONS. 

"  The  sketches  of  Southern  life  in  this  book  are  exquisite  " — Book 
Chat. 

"The  book  does  not  read  like  a  romance.  It  seems  to  be  a  record 
of  an  actual  experience." — New  York  Herald. 

"Full  of  action  and  vigor,  with  descriptions  of  scenery  that  are 
, always  poetic  and  sometimes  exquisite  in  their  word-painting." — Chi- 
cago Hsrald 

*"  A  Dook  Ihe  popularity  of  which  will  not  be  temporary.  It  has 
viriiity  tenderness,  striking  character  pictures,  and  the  American 
flavor  ' — Chicago  Journal. 

•'  W  Read  is  by  no  means  a  realist,  but  his  characters  come  nearer 
tha*  Ideal  than  the  studied  and  overwrought  efforts  of  Howells  and 
James." — Atchison  Champion. 

"  If  the  author  has  not  actually  known  the  people  he  writes  of  in  his 
romance,  he  makes  one  feel  that  he  must  have  known  them,  and  no 
literary  art  can  do  vaoxo..''— Louisville  Critic. 

"  Mr.  Read's  genius  finds  its  best  examplification  in  this  delightful 
book,  which  equals  in  human  interest  and  surpasses  in  dramatic  finish 
any  of  his  previous  productions." — Chicago  Evening  Post. 

"In  *  A  Kentucky  Colonel'  I  find  the  best  and  brightest  pictures  oj 
Southern  Life,  That  young  fellow  Savely — what  a  type — and  how 
many  of  them  went  down  during  the  war."— Alex.  E.  Sweet 

"  A  sparkling  gem  among  recent  literature.  The  characters  live  and 
breathe  a  perfect  mirror  of  Kentucky  life,  from  the  backwoods  revivals 
down  to  the  recipe  for  making  a  mint  julep." — Northwestern. 

"  The  book  will  interest,  not  merely  for  its  plot,  but  for  the  bold 
character-drawing.  Mr.  Read  does  nothing  by  inference.  His  figures 
are  solid  and  imposing,  and  as  sturdy  in  action  as  they  are  bold  in  out- 
line."— Boston  Globe. 

"  There  is  a  rich  vein  of  true  humor  and  of  healthy  and  vigorous 
sentiment,  and  it  has  a  fresh  and  breezy  atmosphere  which  is  heartily 
welcome  in  view  of  the  hot-house  character  of  much  of  our  fiction." — 

Philadelphia  Record. 

"  The  deepest  thinker  and  the  most  progressive  of  all  the  writers  of 
humor  in  this  country  is  Opie  P.  Read.    *    *    *    His  writings  ?"€ 


"A  KENTUCKY  COLONEL  "—SOME  OPINIONS. 

fresn,  sparkling,  witty,  agreeable,  and  so  pleasant  that  he  is  of  more 
service  to  humanity  than  are  scores  of  long-faced  teachers  and  preach- 
ers."— "Brick"  Pomeroy. 

"  It  is  a  novel  that  bears  on  every  page  the  seal  of  authenticity.  It  is 
realism,  it  is  romance,  it  is  photography,  and  it  is  caricature.  *  *  * 
What  we  most  like  it  for  is  the  sincerity  of  its  coloring.  Of  the  many 
stories,  short  and  long,  of  Kentucky  life,  it  gives  the  most  realistic 
pictures." — New  York  Independent. 

" '  A  Kentucky  Colonel,'  the  latest  novel  to  have  the  name  of  big- 
bodied,  big-hearted,  genial  Opie  P.  Read  on  its  title-page,  is  having  an 
immense  sale.  It  is  a  powerful  piece  of  fiction  and  the  best  of  his  pro- 
ductions to  date.  It  will  be  read  and  enjoyed  long  after  its  author  haf 
passed  away." — New  York  Journalist. 

"  *  A  Kentucky  Colonel '  will  be  read  and  appreciated  by  the  scholar, 
for  as  a  work  of  art  it  is  highly  pleasing;  and  it  will  be  read  and 
appreciated  by  the  people,  for  it  is  pure,  is  pervaded  by  a  moral 
atmosphere  most  refreshingly  wholesome,  and  is  intensely  interesting 
from  beginning  to  end." — Little  Rock  Republican. 

"  One  reads  it  from  first  to  last  with  keen  delight,  and  sighs  when 
the  end  comes.  The  tale  is  so  simply  and  sincerely  told,  the  men  and 
women  who  wander  through  the  pages  are  so  evidently  men  and 
women,  with  so  true  a  tang  of  the  Kentucky  soil,  the  humor  is  so  local 
and  unaffected,  the  pictures  of  nature  so  delightful,  that  the  book  is 
closed  with  the  comfortable  sense  of  time  well  spent." — Chicago  Inter 
Ocean. 

*•  So  beautiful,  so  chaste,  so  full  of  simple,  rugged  honesty  and  pure, 
wholesome  sentiment,  that  no  one  can  read  the  book  without  being 
Dettered.  *  *  *  The  book  is  full  of  a  gentle  humor  that  has  just 
enough  tart  in  it  to  make  it  appetizing.  Some  of  the  word-painting  is 
almost  subl  me,  and  everywhere  there  is  that  broad,  sweet  touch  of 
tenderness  that  is  a  part  of  the  author's  very  self.  *  *  *  Ther^  is 
not  a  single  dull  line." — Am.  Commercial  Traveler. 

"  A  delightful  novel.  Kentucky  has  been  productive  of  an  enormous 
quantity  of  self-assertive,  self-respecting  humanity,  which  has  been  the 
theme  of  the  floating  humorist  and  paragrapher;  but  unfortunately 
the  type  has  not  heretofore  been  fixed  in  permanent  literature.  *A 
Kentucky  Colonel '  is  an  attempt  to  do  this,  and  it  is  certainly  not  an 
unsuccessful  attempt.    The  simple,  stalwart  honesty  of  the  Kentucky 


«A  KENTUCKY  COLONEL  "—SOME  OPINIONS. 

man,  tue  unaffected  naturalness  of  the  Kentucky  woman,  both  proof 
in  their  honesty  and  naturalness  against  the  inroads  of  artificiality  and 
convention,  are  exhibited  in  a  style  as  honest  and  natural  as  the  sub- 
ject. Mr.  Read  feels  the  force  of  the  Colonel's  remark  when  he 
proudly  speaks  of  his  daughter  as  a  •  Blue  Grass  girl,  suh,  not  afraid  to 
be  natural.' " — S^.  Louis  Post- Dispatch. 

"  I  don't  think  I  ever  saw  a  more  truthful  portrayal  of  character. 
l*rhe  story  is  new^  strong  in  every  pointy  and  cannot  help  being  a  suc- 
#^^j."— Henry  Clay  Lukens. 

"  Your  *  KentucKy  Colonel '  has  taken  my  household  by  storm.  It  is 
a  delightful  story  admirably  told — a  great  pen  picture  which  I,  as  a 
Kentuckian,  pondered  over  at  times  until  I  had  to  shake  myself  back 
into  every-day  life."— Will  Visscher. 


A  Kentucky  Colonel  "  is  Published  in  one  Large  12mc  Vol- 
ume, OF  342  Pages. 


CLOTH  EXTRA,  -  -  -         $1.00 

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F.  J.  SCHULTE  &  CO.,  Publishers,  Chicago. 


A  Tramp  in  Society 

By  ROBERT  H.  COWDRLY. 


Cloth,  Extra.  $1.25. 
Paper  Cover,  60  Cents. 


One  of  the  most  striking  features  of  the  thnes  is  the  fact  that  so  many 
pens  are  turned  upon  finding  some  solution  for  the  portentous  labor  ques- 
tion. Bellamy's  ideal  has  come  and  gone  without  affecting  any  great 
change  in  the  tendencies  of  the  times  or  the  nature  of  our  laws.  Ignatius 
Donnelly  has  given  us  a  startling  view  of  the  next  century  in  "  Caesar's 
Column,"  a  book  which  has  aroused  to  serious  thought  the  people  of  both 
hemispheres.  It  remained  for  Robert  H.  Cowdrey  to  give  us  the  individ- 
ualistic novel,  and  perhaps  no  man  is  better  fitted  for  this  task.  His  address 
before  the  Tariff  Commission  of  1882  attracted  wide-spread  attention, 
and,  having  been  the  United  Labor  Party  candidate  for  President  of  the 
United  States  in  1888,  his  writings  have  a  prestige  and  standing  with 
thousands  of  readers  even  regaraiess  of  their  literary  merit. 

"  Robert  H.  Cowdrey,  the  author  of  *  A  Tramp  in  Society,'  is  well 
known  in  Chicago  as  a  philanthropist  who  has  devoted  much  of  his  time 
to  investigating  the  evils  of  our  social  system,  and  methods  of  alleviating 
the  distress  of  the  working  classes.  Containing  no  fine-spun  theories,  this 
book  is  a  practical  exponent  of  the  evils  which  oppress  the  people,  and 
indicates  practical  methods  by  which  they  may  be  aided," — Chicago 
Graphic. 

"  We  have  had  a  dozen  or  more  novels  of  late  that  have  had  new 
economic  schemes  of  living  for  a  basis,  but  mostly  advocating  state  social- 
ism. At  last  we  have  the  individualistic  novel,  and  it  ought  to  win  wide- 
spread favor.  Mr.  Cowdrey  has  strong  conviction,  a  good  command  ol 
English,  and  fertile  imaginaticn.  The  influence  of  '  A  Tramp  in  Society' 
will  at  least  extend  the  growing  feeling  that  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  maj 
be  nigher  than  we  think." — St,  Louis  Republic. 

"As  a  criticism  of  existing  conditions  it  is  sensible  and  incisive."— 
Chicago  Times. 

"  In  the  form  of  a  novel,  •  A  Tramp  in  Society '  presents  a  series  oi 
terrible  indictments  of  our  social  system  and  of  the  thing  we  call  law.  If 
all  the  children  of  to-day  were  made  to  read  this  book,  the  men  of  twenty 
years  hence  would  be  apostles  of  a  new  social  dispensation.  Mr.  Cowdrej 
tells  the  story  of  the  wrongs  he  has  seen,  and  he  deserves  a  wide  hearing," 
— New  York  Morning  yournal,  • 

"  There  is  not  an  uninteresting  page  in  all  the  book." — Hugh  O.  Pente^ 
cost. 

"  *  A  Tramp  in  Society  *  shows  that  he  who  controls  the  land  has  the 
power  to  control  all  industries,  and  therefore  the  lives  and  fortunes  of  the 
people.  As  a  thought-inspiring  book  there  are  few  better,  and  we  bespeak 
for  it  a  wide  circulation.'* — Hartford  Examiner* 


A  TRAMP  IN  SOCIETY;   By  ROBERT  H.  COWDREY. 

*'  The  author  of  *  A  Tramp  in  Society  '  is  a  thinker  of  no  mean  order. 
He  believes  the  time  is  ripe  for  men  to  speak  as  'angels,  trumpet-tongued,' 
but  also  that  they  should  make  ready  for  the  fearful  battle  which  confronts 
modern  civilization.  The  creations  of  his  imagination  are  quite  realistic  in 
their  eloquence,  and  the  words  he  makes  them  utter  may  have  some  good 
effect,  if  read  in  the  right  quarters.  But  when  one  gets  away  from  the 
spell  of  his  arguments,  the  question  arises  whether  there  is  here  in  free 
America  any  such  condition  of  affairs  as  he  pictures,  and  supplements  by 
quoting  the  forebodings  of  Mill,  Spencer,  and  Lincoln.  Was  Tolstoi  right 
when  he  said,  *  We  are  willing  to  help  the  poor  in  every  way,  except  by 
getting  off  their  backs  and  letting  them  help  themselves '  ?  " — New  York 
Recorder. 

"  '  A  Tramp  in  Society  "  is  a  strong,  natural,  and  therefore  realistic 
piece  of  work.  The  first  thought  it  suggests  is  that  in  Edgar  Bartlett  we 
have  an  overdrawn  picture  of  the  ups  and  downs  which  an  able  and  refmed 
man  can  experience  in  a  land  like  ours.  A  second  sober  thought,  how- 
ever, corrects  this  impression,  and  convinces  the  reader  that  here  is  a  real 
character,  whose  prototypes  exist  in  great  numbers  in  all  our  large  cities, 
and  that  they  are  the  legitimate  results  of  our  present  imperfect  social  con- 
ditions. The  fact  that  the  book  is  from  the  pen  of  Robert  H.  Cowdrey,  a 
well-known  labor  leader,  may  prejudice  some  minds  against  it  before  they 
have  read  its  thrilling  and  fascinating  pages;  but  no  one  who  reads  the 
work  carefully  can  retain  that  prejudice  or  restrain  admiration  for  the  man 
who  can  write  a  story  that  contains  so  much  that  is  helpful  and  bettering  to 
humanity." — The  Arkansaw  Traveler. 

"  *  A  Tramp  in  Society '  is  written  with  considerable  force.  The  author 
has  made  a  photograph  of  existing  social  conditions,  with  terrible  poverty 
on  one  hand  and  heaped-up  wealth  on  the  other.  The  hero  is  a  man  who, 
from  a  station  of  wealth  and  independence,  falls,  through  no  fault  of  his 
own,  into  the  depth  of  poverty,  and  becomes  an  outcast  tramp.  Rescued 
'rom  his  degradation,  he  is  made  to  give  the  result  of  his  study  of  the  evils 
that  exist,  and  he  makes  a  wonderfully  strong  showing." — Toledo  Blade. 

"  As  a  sociological  treatise  it  has  claims  on  our  attention  by  offering  a 
solution  of  the  social  problems  that  are  now  disquieting  the  world.  The 
thought  fulness  shown  by  the  author  in  his  dealing  with  these  hard  questions 
entitles  his  opinions  to  respect." — Chicago  Inter  Ocean. 

"  A  very  clever  book.  No  wise  saws  and  little  theoretical  drivel,  but  a 
story  well  and  strongly  written." — Minneapolis  Journal. 

"  Mr.  Cowdrey  has  succeeded  in  mingling  such  apparently  hostile  ele- 
ments as  political  economy  and  fiction.  His  hero  delivers  frequent  talks 
on  the  questions  of  wages,  rents,  money,  ownership  of  land,  etc.,  but  he 
makes  them  interesting  and  really  presents  his  ideas  in  very  attractive 
form." — San  Francisco  Chronicle. 

Price  in  cloth,  extra,  gilt  top,  $1.25.     Paper  covers,  50c. 
For  sale  by  all  book-sellers,  or  will  be  mailed,  postpaid,  to  any  address 
on  receipt  of  price. 

F.   J.    SOHULTE    &    CO.,    Publishers,^ 
296  Dearborn  St.,  CHICAGO. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 
BERKELEY    .    , 

Return  to  desk  from  which  borrowed. 
This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


20ADr'51Wff 

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LD  21-100m-ll,'49(B7146sl6)476 


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